I     _, 


RED  GAP 

Bu  HARRY- !. ,FON-WILSON 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 


BOOKS  BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 

Boss  OF  LITTLE  ARCADY 
BUNKER  BEAN 
EWING'S  LADY 
LIONS  OF  THE  LORD 
RUGGLES  OF  RED  GAP 
SPENDERS 


THEY  JUST  CLENCHED  THEIR  HANDS  AND  HUNG  ON  WIL- 
FRED'S  WILD,  FREE  WORDS" 


OOMEWHERE 
IN  RED  GAP 

By 

Harry  Leon  Wilson 
'/  .,. 


ILLUSTRATED  BY 

JOHN  R.  NEILL,  F.  R.  GRUGER,  AND 
HENRY  RALEIGH 


GARDEN  CITY  NEW  YORK 

DOUBLEDAY,  PAGE  &  COMPANY 

1916 


Copyright,  1916,  by 

DOUBLEDAY,  PAGE  &  COMPANY 

All  rights  reserved,  including  that  of 

translation  into  foreign  languages, 

including  the  Scandinavian 


COPYRIGHT.  1915,   I9l6,  BY  THE  CURTIS  PUBLISHING  COMPANT 


To 
GEORGE  HORACE  LORIMER 


•»  e~«  jt  cj 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.     The  Red  Splash  of  Romance 

II.  Ma  Pettengill  and  the  Song  of  Songs  ...  4^ 

III.  The  Real  Peruvian  Doughnuts 8£ 

IV.  Once  a  Scotchman,  Always 125 

V.     Non  Plush  Ultra I1?* 

VI.     Cousin  Egbert  Intervenes 223 

VII.     Kate;  or,  Up  From  the  Depths 273 

VIII.     Pete's  B'other-in-law 318 

IX.    Little  Old  New  York                   361 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

".They  just  clenched  their  hands  and  hung  on  Wil 
fred's  wild,  free  words"  (See  page  30)  .  Frontispiece 

FACING  PAGE 

"  Chester  just  set  there  with  his  mouth  open,  like 

something  you  see  at  one  of  these  here  aquariums' '      64 

"She  kind  of  gasped  and  shivered  in  horrible  de 
light.  'I've  kissed  the  cross  at  last, 'she  mutters"  78 

" '  Why,  actually,  I've  more  than  once  had  money 

left  over  at  the  end  of  the  quarter '"     .     .     .     .     166 

"She  was  standing  on  the  centre  table  by  now  so 
she  could  lamp  herself  in  the  glass  over  the 
mantel" 198 

"All  sunned  up  like  a  man  that  knows  the  world  is 

his  oyster  and  every  month's  got  an  *  r '  in  it "     234 

"  *  Mark  my  words,'  he  says,  '  they're  either  a  horn 

or  a  bug'" 296 

"The  Swede  bristles  up  and  says:  'That  sounds 
like  fighting  talk!'  I  says:  'Your  hearing  is 
perfect/" 346 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 


I 

THE  RED  SPLASH  OF  ROMANCE 

THE  walls  of  the  big  living-room  in  the 
Arrowhead  ranch  house  are  tastefully  en 
livened  here  and  there  with  artistic  spoils  of 
the  owner,  Mrs.  Lysander  John  Pettengill.  There 
are  family  portraits  in  crayon,  photo-engravings  of 
noble  beasts  clipped  from  the  Breeder's  Gazette,  an 
etched  cathedral  or  two,  a  stuffed  and  varnished  trout 
of  such  size  that  no  one  would  otherwise  have  believed 
in  it,  a  print  in  three  colours  of  a  St.  Bernard  dog  with 
a  marked  facial  resemblance  to  the  late  William  E. 
Gladstone,  and  a  triumph  of  architectural  perspective 
revealing  two  sides  of  the  Pettengill  block,  corner  of 
Fourth  and  Main  streets,  Red  Gap,  made  vivacious 
by  a  bearded  fop  on  horseback  who  doffs  his  silk  hat 
to  a  couple  of  overdressed  ladies  with  parasols  in  a 
passing  victoria. 

And  there  is  the  photograph  of  the  fat  man.  He  is 
very  large — both  high  and  wide.  He  has  filled  the 
lens  and  now  compels  the  eye.  His  broad  face 
beams  a  friendly  interest.  His  moustache  is  a  flourish 
ing,  uncurbed,  riotous  growth  above  his  billowy  chin. 

The  checked  coat,  held  recklessly  aside  by  a  hand  on 
each  hip,  reveals  an  incredible  expanse  of  waistcoat, 

3 


4  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

the  pattern  of  which  raves  horribly.  From  pocket 
to  pocket  of  this  gaudy  shield  curves  a  watch  chain 
of  massive  links — nearly  a  yard  of  it,  one  guesses. 

Often  I  have  glanced  at  this  noisy  thing  tacked  to 
the  wall,  entranced  by  the  simple  width  of  the  man. 
Now  on  a  late  afternoon  I  loitered  before  it  while  my 
hostess  changed  from  riding  breeches  to  the  gown  of 
lavender  and  lace  in  which  she  elects  to  drink  tea 
after  a  day's  hard  work  along  the  valleys  of  the  Ar 
rowhead.  And  for  the  first  time  I  observed  a  line  of 
writing  beneath  the  portrait,  the  writing  of  my  hos 
tess,  a  rough,  downright,  plain  fashion  of  script: 
"Reading  from  left  to  right — Mr.  Ben  Sutton, 
Popular  Society  Favourite  of  Nome,  Alaska." 

"Reading  from  left  to  right ! "  Here  was  the  intent 
facetious.  And  Ma  Pettengill  is  never  idly  facetious. 
Always,  as  the  advertisements  say,  "There's  a 
reason!"  And  now,  also  for  the  first  time,  I  noticed 
some  printed  verses  on  a  sheet  of  thickish  yellow 
paper  tacked  to  the  wall  close  beside  the  photograph 
— so  close  that  I  somehow  divined  an  intimate  re 
lationship  between  the  two.  With  difficulty  remov 
ing  my  gaze  from  the  gentleman  who  should  be  read 
from  left  to  right,  I  scanned  these  verses: 

SONG  OF  THE  OPEN  ROAD 

A  child  of  the  road — a  gypsy  I — 

My  path  o'er  the  land  and  sea; 
With  the  fire  of  youth  I  warm  my  nights 

And  my  days  are  wild  and  free. 


4 

SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  5 

Then  ho!  for  the  wild,  the  open  road! 

Afar  from  the  haunts  of  men. 
The  woods  and  the  hills  for  my  spirit  untamed — 

Fm  away  to  mountain  and  glen. 

If  ever  I  tried  to  leave  my  hills 

To  abide  in  the  cramped  haunts  of  men, 

The  urge  of  the  wild  to  her  wayward  child 
Would  drag  me  to  freedom  again. 

Tm  slave  to  the  call  of  the  open  road; 

In  your  cities  I'd  stifle  and  die. 
Tm  off  to  the  hills  in  fancy  I  see — 
On  the  breast  of  old  earth  Til  lie. 

WILFRED  LENNOX,  the  Hobo  Poet, 

On  a  Coasi-to-Coast  Walking  Tour. 
These  Cards  for  sale. 

I  briefly  pondered  the  lyric.  It  told  its  own  simple 
story  and  could  at  once  have  been  dismissed  but  for 
its  divined  and  puzzling  relationship  to  the  popular 
society  favourite  of  Nome,  Alaska.  What  could 
there  be  in  this? 

Mrs.  Ly sander  John  Pettengill  bustled  in  upon  my 
speculation,  but  as  usual  I  was  compelled  to  wait  for 
the  talk  I  wanted.  For  some  moments  she  would  be 
only  the  tired  owner  of  the  Arrowhead  Ranch — in  the 
tea  gown  of  a  debutante  and  with  too  much  powder 
on  one  side  of  her  nose — and  she  must  have  at  least 
one  cup  of  tea  so  corrosive  that  the  Scotch  whiskey 


6  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

she  adds  to  it  is  but  a  merciful  dilution.  She  now 
drank  eagerly  of  the  fearful  brew,  dulled  the  bite  of  it 
with  smoke  from  a  hurriedly  built  cigarette,  and  re 
laxed  gratefully  into  one  of  those  chairs  which  are  all 
that  most  of  us  remember  William  Morris  for.  Even 
then  she  must  first  murmur  of  the  day's  annoyances, 
provided  this  time  by  officials  of  the  United  States 
Forest  Reserve.  In  the  beginning  I  must  always 
allow  her  a  little  to  have  her  own  way. 

"The  annual  spring  rumpus  with  them  rangers," 
she  wearily  boomed.  "Every  year  they  tell  me  just 
where  to  turn  my  cattle  out  on  the  Reserve,  and  every 
year  I  go  ahead  and  turn  'em  out  where  I  want  'em 
turned  out,  which  ain't  the  same  place  at  all,  and  then 
I  have  to  listen  patiently  to  their  kicks  and  politely 
answer  all  letters  from  the  higher-ups  and  wait  for  the 
official  permit,  which  always  comes — and  it's  wearing 
on  a  body.  Darn  it!  They'd  ought  to  know  by  this 
time  I  always  get  my  own  way.  If  they  wasn't  such 
a  decent  bunch  I'd  have  words  with  'em,  giving  me  the 
same  trouble  year  after  year,  probably  because  I'm 
a  weak,  defenceless  woman.  However!" 

The  lady  rested  largely,  inert  save  for  the  hand  that 
raised  the  cigarette  automatically  to  her  lips.  My 
moment  had  come. 

"What  did  Wilfred  Lennox,  the  hobo  poet,  have  to 
do  with  Mr.  Ben  Sutton,  of  Nome,  Alaska?"  I  gently 
inquired. 

"More  than  he  wanted,"  replied  the  lady.  Her 
glance  warmed  with  memories;  she  hovered  musingly 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  7 

on  the  verge  of  recital.  But  the  cigarette  was  half 
done  and  at  its  best.  I  allowed  her  another  moment, 
a  moment  in  which  she  laughed  confidentially  to 
herself,  a  little  dry,  throaty  laugh.  I  knew  that 
laugh.  She  would  be  marshalling  certain  events  in 
their  just  and  diverting  order.  But  they  seemed  to 
be  many  and  of  confusing  values. 

"Some  said  he  not  only  wasn't  a  hobo  but  wasn't 
even  a  poet,"  she  presently  murmured,  and  smoked 
again.  Then:  "That  Ben  Sutton,  now,  he's  a  case. 
Comes  from  Alaska  and  don't  like  fresh  eggs  for 
breakfast  because  he  says  they  ain't  got  any  kick  to 
'em  like  Alaska  eggs  have  along  in  March,  and  he's 
got  to  have  canned  milk  for  his  coffee.  Say,  I  got  a 
three-quarters  Jersey  down  in  Red  Gap  gives  milk 
so  rich  that  the  cream  just  naturally  trembles  into 
butter  if  you  speak  sharply  to  it  or  even  give  it  a 
cross  look;  not  for  Ben  though.  Had  to  send  out  for 
canned  milk  that  morning.  I  drew  the  line  at  hunt 
ing  up  case  eggs  for  him  though.  He  had  to  put  up 
with  insipid  fresh  ones.  And  fat,  that  man!  My 
lands!  He  travels  a  lot  in  the  West  when  he  does 
leave  home,  and  he  tells  me  it's  the  fear  of  his  life  he'll 
get  wedged  into  one  of  them  narrow-gauge  Pullmans 
some  time  and  have  to  be  chopped  out.  Well,  as  I 
was  saying "  She  paused. 

"But  you  haven't  begun,"  I  protested.  I  sharply 
tapped  the  printed  verses  and  the  photograph  read 
ing  from  left  to  right.  Now  she  became  animated, 
speaking  as  she  expertly  rolled  a  fresh  cigarette. 


8  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"Say,  did  you  ever  think  what  aggravating 
minxes  women  are  after  they  been  married  a  few 
years — after  the  wedding  ring  gets  worn  a  little  bit 
thin?" 

This  was  not  only  brutal;  it  seemed  irrelevant. 

"Wilfred  Lennox "  I  tried  to  insist,  but  she 

commandingly  raised  the  new  cigarette  at  me. 

"Yes,  sir!  Ever  know  one  of  'em  married  for  as 
long  as  ten  years  that  didn't  in  her  secret  heart  have 
a  sort  of  contempt  for  her  life  partner  as  being  a 
stuffy,  plodding  truck  horse?  Of  course  they  keep  a 
certain  dull  respect  for  him  as  a  provider,  but  they 
can't  see  him  as  dashing  and  romantic  any  more;  he 
ain't  daring  and  adventurous.  All  he  ever  does  is  go 
down  and  open  up  the  store  or  push  back  the  roll-top, 
and  keep  from  getting  run  over  on  the  street.  One 
day's  like  another  with  him,  never  having  any  wild, 
lawless  instincts  or  reckless  moods  that  make  a  man 
fascinating — about  the  nearest  he  ever  comes  to  ad 
venture  is  when  he  opens  the  bills  the  first  of  the 
month.  And  she  often  seeing  him  without  any  collar 
on,  and  needing  a  shave  mebbe,  and  cherishing  her 
own  secret  romantic  dreams,  while  like  as  not  he's 
prosily  figuring  out  how  he's  going  to  make  the  next 
payment  on  the  endowment  policy. 

"It's  a  hard,  tiresome  life  women  lead,  chained  to 
these  here  plodders.  That's  why  rich  widows  gener 
ally  pick  out  the  dashing  young  devils  they  do  for 
their  second,  having  buried  the  man  that  made  it 
for  'em.  Oh,  they  like  him  well  enough,  call  him 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  9 

'Father'  real  tenderly,  and  see  that  he  changes  to  the 
heavy  flannels  on  time,  but  he  don't  ever  thrill  them, 
and  when  they  order  three  hundred  and  fifty  dollars' 
worth  of  duds  from  the  Boston  Cash  Emporium  and 
dress  up  like  a  foreign  countess,  they  don't  do  it  for 
Father,  they  do  it  for  the  romantic  guy  in  the  maga 
zine  serial  they're  reading,  the  handsome,  cynical  ad 
venturer  that  has  such  an  awful  power  over  women. 
They  know  darned  well  they  won't  ever  meet  him; 
still  it's  just  as  well  to  be  ready  in  case  he  ever  should 
make  Red  Gap — or  wherever  they  live — and  it's  easy 
with  the  charge  account  there,  and  Father  never  fuss 
ing  more  than  a  little  about  the  bills. 

"Not  that  I  blame  'em.  We're  all  alike — innocent 
enough,  with  freaks  here  and  there  that  ain't.  Why, 
I  remember  about  a  thousand  years  ago  I  was  reading 
a  book  called  'Lillian's  Honour,'  in  which  the  rightful 
earl  didn't  act  like  an  earl  had  ought  to,  but  went 
travelling  off  over  the  moors  with  a  passel  of  gypsies, 
with  all  the  she-gypsies  falling  in  love  with  him,  and 
no  wonder — he  was  that  dashing.  Well,  I  used  to 
think  what  might  happen  if  he  should  come  along 
while  Lysander  John  was  out  with  the  beef  round-up 
or  something.  I  was  well-meaning,  understand,  but 
at  that  I'd  ought  to  have  been  laid  out  with  a  pick- 
handle.  Oh,  the  nicest  of  us  got  specks  inside  us — 
if  ever  we  did  cut  loose  the  best  one  of  us  would  make 
the  worst  man  of  you  look  like  nothing  worse  than  a 
naughty  little  boy  cutting  up  in  Sunday-school. 
What  holds  us,  of  course — we  always  dream  of  being 


10  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

took  off  our  feet;  of  being  carried  off  by  main  force 
against  our  wills  while  we  snuggle  up  to  the  romantic 
brute  and  plead  with  him  to  spare  us — and  the  most 
reckless  of  'em  don't  often  get  their  nerve  up  to  that. 
Well,  as  I  was  saying " 

But  she  was  not  saying.  The  thing  moved  too 
slowly.  And  still  the  woman  paltered  with  her 
poisoned  tea  and  made  cigarettes  and  muttered  in- 
consequently,  as  when  she  now  broke  out  after  a 
glance  at  the  photograph: 

"That  Ben  Sutton  certainly  runs  amuck  when  be 
buys  his  vests.  He  must  have  about  fifty,  and  the 
quietest  one  in  the  lot  would  make  a  leopard  skin 
look  like  a  piker."  Again  her  glance  dreamed  off  to 
visions. 

I  seated  myself  before  her  with  some  emphasis  and 
said  firmly:  "Now,  then!"  It  worked. 

"Wilfred  Lennox,"  she  began,  "calling  himself  the 
hobo  poet,  gets  into  Red  Gap  one  day  and  makes  the 
rounds  with  that  there  piece  of  poetry  you  see; 
pushes  into  stores  and  offices  and  hands  the  piece  out, 
and  like  as  not  they  crowd  a  dime  or  two  bits  onto 
him  and  send  him  along.  That's  what  I  done.  I 
was  waiting  in  Dr.  Percy  Hailey  Martingale's  office 
for  a  little  painless  dentistry,  and  I  took  Wilfred's 
poem  and  passed  him  a  two-bit  piece,  and  Doc  Mar 
tingale  does  the  same,  and  Wilfred  blew  on  to  the 
next  office.  A  dashing  and  romantic  figure  he  was, 
though  kind  of  fat  and  pasty  for  a  man  that  was  walk 
ing  from  coast  to  coast,  but  a  smooth  talker  with 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  11 

beautiful  features  and  about  nine  hundred  dollars' 
worth  of  hair  and  a  soft  hat  and  one  of  these  flowing 
neckties.  Red  it  was. 

"So  I  looked  over  his  piece  of  poetry — about  the 
open  road  for  his  untamed  spirit  and  him  being  stifled 
in  the  cramped  haunts  of  men — and  of  course  I  get 
his  number.  All  right  about  the  urge  of  the  wild  to 
her  wayward  child,  but  here  he  was  spending  a  lot  of 
time  in  the  cramped  haunts  of  men  taking  their  small 
change  away  from  'em  and  not  seeming  to  stifle  one 
bit. 

"Ain't  this  new  style  of  tramp  funny?  Now  in 
stead  of  coming  round  to  the  back  door  and  asking 
for  a  hand-out  like  any  self-respecting  tramp  had 
ought  to,  they  march  up  to  the  front  door,  and  they're 
somebody  with  two  or  three  names  that's  walking 
round  the  world  on  a  wager  they  made  with  one  of  the 
Vanderbilt  boys  or  John  D.  Rockefeller.  They've 
walked  thirty-eight  hundred  miles  already  and  got 
the  papers  to  prove  it — a  letter  from  the  mayor  of 
Scranton,  Pennsylvania,  and  the  mayor  of  Daven 
port,  Iowa,  a  picture  post  card  of  themselves  on  the 
courthouse  steps  at  Denver,  and  they've  bet  forty 
thousand  dollars  they  could  start  out  without  a  cent 
and  come  back  in  twenty-two  months  with  money  in 
their  pocket — and  ain't  it  a  good  joke? — with  every 
body  along  the  way  entering  into  the  spirit  of  it  and 
passing  them  quarters  and  such,  and  thank  you  very 
much  for  your  two  bits  for  the  picture  post  card — and 
they  got  another  showing  'em  in  front  of  the  Mormon 


12  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Tabernacle  at  Salt  Lake  City,  if  you'd  like  that,  too — 
and  thank  you  again — and  now  they'll  be  off  once 
more  to  the  open  road  and  the  wild,  free  life.  Not! 
Yes,  two  or  three  good  firm  Nots.  Having  milked 
the  town  they'll  be  right  down  to  the  dee-po  with  their 
silver  changed  to  bills,  waiting  for  No.  6  to  come 
along,  and  ho!  for  the  open  railroad  and  another 
town  that  will  skin  pretty.  I  guess  I've  seen  eight 
or  ten  of  them  boys  in  the  last  five  years,  with  their 
letters  from  mayors. 

"But  this  here  Wilfred  Lennox  had  a  new  graft. 
He  was  the  first  I'd  give  up  to  for  mere  poetry.  He 
didn't  have  a  single  letter  from  a  mayor,  nor  even  a 
picture  card  of  himself  standing  with  his  hat  off  in 
front  of  Pike's  Peak — nothing  but  poetry.  But,  as  I 
said,  he  was  there  with  a  talk  about  pining  for  the 
open  road  and  despising  the  cramped  haunts  of  men, 
and  he  had  appealing  eyes  and  all  this  flowing  hair 
and  necktie.  So  I  says  to  myself:  'All  right,  Wil 
fred,  you  win ! '  and  put  my  purse  back  in  my  bag  and 
thought  no  more  of  it. 

"Yet  not  so  was  it  to  be.  Wilfred,  working  the 
best  he  could  to  make  a  living  doing  nothing,  pretty 
soon  got  to  the  office  of  Alonzo  Price,  Choice  Im 
proved  Real  Estate  and  Price's  Addition.  Lon  was 
out  for  the  moment,  but  who  should  be  there  waiting 
for  him  but  his  wife,  Mrs.  Henrietta  Templeton 
Price,  recognized  leader  of  our  literary  and  artistic 
set.  Or  I  think  they  call  it  a  '  group '  or  a  '  coterie '  or 
something.  Setting  at  Lon's  desk  she  was,  toying 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  13 

petulantly  with  horrid  old  pens  and  blotters,  and 
probably  bestowing  glances  of  disrelish  from  time  to 
time  round  the  grimy  office  where  her  scrubby  little 
husband  toiled  his  days  away  in  unromantic  squalor. 

"I  got  to  tell  you  about  Henrietta.  She's  one  of 
them  like  I  just  said  the  harsh  things  about,  with  the 
secret  cry  in  her  heart  for  romance  and  adventure  and 
other  forbidden  things  and  with  a  kindly  contempt  for 
peaceful  Alonzo.  She  admits  to  being  thirty-six,  so 
you  can  figure  it  out  for  yourself.  Of  course  she  gets 
her  husband  wrong  at  that,  as  women  so  often  do. 
Alonzo  has  probably  the  last  pair  of  side  whiskers  out 
side  of  a  steel  engraving  and  stands  five  feet  two, 
weighing  a  hundred  and  twenty-six  pounds  at  the 
ring  side,  but  he's  game  as  a  swordfish,  and  as  for 
being  romantic  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word — well,  no 
one  that  ever  heard  him  sell  a  lot  in  Price's  Addition 
— three  miles  and  a  half  up  on  the  mesa,  with  only  the 
smoke  of  the  canning  factory  to  tell  a  body  they  was 
still  near  the  busy  haunts  of  men,  that  and  a  mile  of 
concrete  sidewalk  leading  a  life  of  complete  idleness — 
I  say  no  one  that  ever  listened  to  Lon  sell  a  lot  up 
there,  pointing  out  on  a  blue  print  the  proposed  site  of 
the  Carnegie  Library,  would  accuse  him  of  not  being 
romantic. 

"But  of  course  Henrietta  never  sees  Lon's  romance 
and  he  ain't  always  had  the  greatest  patience  with 
hers — like  the  time  she  got  up  the  Art  Loan  Exhibit 
to  get  new  books  for  the  M.  E.  Sabbath-school 
library  and  got  Spud  Mulkins  of  the  El  Adobe  to  lend 


14  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

'em  the  big  gold-framed  oil  painting  that  hangs  over 
his  bar.  Some  of  the  other  ladies  objected  to  this — 
the  picture  was  a  big  pink  hussy  lying  down  beside 
the  ocean — but  Henrietta  says  art  for  art's  sake  is 
pure  to  them  that  are  pure,  or  something,  and  they're 
doing  such  things  constantly  in  the  East;  and  I'm 
darned  if  Spud  didn't  have  his  oil  painting  down  and 
the  mosquito  netting  ripped  off  it  before  Alonzo  heard 
about  it  and  put  the  Not-at-All  on  it.  He  wouldn't 
reason  with  Henrietta  either.  He  just  said  his  ob 
jection  was  that  every  man  that  saw  it  would  put  one 
foot  up  groping  for  the  brass  railing,  which  would 
be  undignified  for  a  Sabbath-school  scheme,  and  that 
she'd  better  hunt  out  something  with  clothes  on  like 
Whistler's  portrait  of  his  mother,  or,  if  she  wanted 
the  nude  in  art,  to  get  the  Horse  Fair  or  something 
with  animals. 

"I  tell  you  that  to  show  you  how  they  don't  hit 
it  off  sometimes.  Then  Henrietta  sulks.  Kind  of 
pinched  and  hungry  looking  she  is,  drapes  her  black 
hair  down  over  one  side  of  her  high  forehead,  wears 
daring  gowns — that's  what  she  calls  'em  anyway — 
and  reads  the  most  outrageous  kinds  of  poetry  out 
loud  to  them  that  will  listen.  Likes  this  Omar 
Something  stuff  about  your  path  being  beset  with 
pitfalls  and  gin  fizzes  and  getting  soused  out  under  a 
tree  with  your  girl. 

"I'm  just  telling  you  so  you'll  get  Henrietta  when 
Wilfred  Lennox  drips  gracefully  in  with  his  piece  of 
poetry  in  one  hand.  Of  course  she  must  have  looked 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  15 

long  *nd  nervously  at  Wilfred,  then  read  his  poetry, 
then  looked  again.  There  before  her  was  Romance 
against  a  background  of  Alonzo  Price,  who  never  had 
an  adventurous  or  evil  thought  in  his  life,  and  wore 
rubbers!  Oh,  sure!  He  must  have  palsied  her  at 
once,  this  wild,  free  creature  of  the  woods  who 
couldn't  stand  the  cramped  haunts  of  men.  And  I 
have  said  that  Wilfred  was  there  with  the  wild,  free 
words  about  himself,  and  the  hat  and  tie  and  the 
waving  brown  hair  that  give  him  so  much  trouble. 
Shucks !  I  don't  blame  the  woman.  It's  only  a  few 
years  since  we  been  let  out  from  under  lock  and  key. 
Give  us  a  little  time  to  get  our  bearings,  say  I.  Wil 
fred  was  just  one  big  red  splash  before  her  yearning 
eyes;  he  blinded  her.  And  he  stood  there  telling  how 
this  here  life  in  the  marts  of  trade  would  sure  twist 
and  blacken  some  of  the  very  finest  chords  in  his 
being.  Something  like  that  it  must  have  been. 

"Anyway,  about  a  quarter  to  six  a  procession  went 
up  Fourth  Street,  consisting  of  Wilfred  Lennox,  Hen 
rietta,  and  Alonzo.  The  latter  was  tripping  along 
about  three  steps  back  of  the  other  two  and  every 
once  in  a  while  he  would  stop  for  a  minute  and  simply 
look  puzzled.  I  saw  him.  It's  really  a  great  pity 
Lon  insists  on  wearing  a  derby  hat  with  his  side 
whiskers.  To  my  mind  the  two  never  seem  meant 
for  each  other. 

"The  procession  went  to  the  Price  mansion  up  on 
Ophir  Avenue.  And  that  evening  Henrietta  had  in  a 
few  friends  to  listen  to  the  poet  recite  his  verses  and 


16  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

tell  anecdotes  about  himself.  About  five  or  six 
ladies  in  the  parlour  and  their  menfolks  smoking  out 
on  the  front  porch.  The  men  didn't  seem  to  fall  for 
Wilfred's  open-road  stuff  the  way  the  ladies  did. 
Wilfred  was  a  good  reciter  and  held  the  ladies  with 
his  voice  and  his  melting  blue  eyes  with  the  long 
lashes,  and  Henrietta  was  envied  for  having  nailed 
him.  That  is,  the  women  envied  her.  The  men  sort 
of  slouched  off  down  to  the  front  gate  and  then  went 
down  to  the  Temperance  Billiard  Parlour,  where 
several  of  'em  got  stewed.  Most  of  'em,  like  old 
Judge  Ballard,  who  come  to  the  country  in  '62,  and 
Jeff  Tuttle,  who's  always  had  more  than  he  wanted  of 
the  open  road,  were  very  cold  indeed  to  Wilfred's 
main  proposition.  It  is  probable  that  low  mutter- 
ings  might  have  been  heard  among  'em,  especially 
after  a  travelling  man  that  was  playing  pool  said  the 
hobo  poet  had  come  in  on  the  Pullman  of  No.  6. 

"  But  I  must  say  that  Alonzo  didn't  seem  to  mutter 
any,  from  all  I  could  hear.  Pathetic,  the  way  that 
little  man  will  believe  right  up  to  the  bitter  end.  He 
said  that  for  a  hobo  Wilfred  wrote  very  good  poetry, 
better  than  most  hobos  could  write,  he  thought,  and 
that  Henrietta  always  knew  what  she  was  doing. 
So  the  evening  come  to  a  peaceful  end,  most  of  the 
men  getting  back  for  their  wives  and  Alonzo  showing 
up  in  fair  shape  and  plumb  eager  for  the  comfort  of 
his  guest.  It  was  Alonzo's  notion  that  the  guest 
would  of  course  want  to  sleep  out  in  the  front  yard  on 
the  breast  of  old  earth  where  he  could  look  up  at  the 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  17 

pretty  stars  and  feel  at  home,  and  he  was  getting  out  a 
roll  of  blankets  when  the  guest  said  he  didn't  want  to 
make  the  least  bit  of  trouble  and  for  one  night  he'd 
manage  to  sleep  inside  four  stifling  walls  in  a  regular 
bed,  like  common  people  do.  So  Lon  bedded  him 
down  in  the  guest  chamber,  but  opened  up  the  four 
windows  in  it  and  propped  the  door  wide  open  so  the 
poor  fellow  could  have  a  breeze  and  not  smother. 
He  told  this  downtown  the  next  morning,  and  he  was 
beginning  to  look  right  puzzled  indeed.  He  said  the 
wayward  child  of  Nature  had  got  up  after  about  half 
an  hour  and  shut  all  the  windows  and  the  door.  Lon 
thought  first  he  was  intending  to  commit  suicide,  but 
he  didn't  like  to  interfere.  He  was  telling  Jeff  Tuttle 
and  me  about  it  when  we  happened  to  pass  his  office. 
"  'And  there's  another  funny  thing,' "  he  says.  'This 
chap  was  telling  us  all  the  way  up  home  last  night  that 
he  never  ate  meat — simply  fruits  and  nuts  with  a 
mug  of  spring  water.  He  said  eating  the  carcasses  of 
murdered  beasts  was  abhorrent  to  him.  But  when 
we  got  down  to  the  table  he  consented  to  partake  of 
the  roast  beef  and  he  did  so  repeatedly.  We  usually 
have  cold  meat  for  lunch  the  day  after  a  rib  roast,  but 
there  will  be  something  else  to-day;  and  along  with 
the  meat  he  drank  two  bottles  of  beer,  though  with 
mutter  ings  of  disgust.  He  said  spring  water  in  the 
hills  was  pure,  but  that  water  out  of  pipes  was  full  of 
typhoid  germs.  He  admitted  that  there  were  times 
when  the  grosser  appetites  assailed  him.  And  they 
assailed  him  this  morning,  too.  He  said  he  might 


18  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

bring  himself  to  eat  some  chops,  and  he  did  it  without 
scarcely  a  struggle.  He  ate  six.  He  said  living  the 
nauseous  artificial  life  even  for  one  night  brought  back 
the  hateful  meat  craving.  I  don't  know.  He  is  un 
deniably  peculiar.  And  of  course  you've  heard  about 
Pettikin's  affair  for  this  evening?' 

"We  had.  Just  before  leaving  the  house  I  had 
received  Henrietta's  card  inviting  me  to  the  country 
club  that  evening  'to  meet  Mr.  Wilfred  Lennox,  Poet 
and  Nature  Lover,  who  will  recite  his  original  verses 
and  give  a  brief  talk  on '  'The  World's  Debt  to  Poetry." ' 
And  there  you  have  the  whole  trouble.  Henrietta 
should  have  known  better.  But  I've  let  out  what 
women  really  are.  I  told  Alonzo  I  would  sure  be 
among  those  present.  I  said  it  sounded  good.  And 
then  Alonzo  pipes  up  about  Ben  Sutton  coming  to 
town  on  the  eleven  forty-two  from  the  West.  Ben 
makes  a  trip  out  of  Alaska  every  summer  and  never 
fails  to  stop  off  a  day  or  two  with  Lon,  they  having 
been  partners  up  North  in  '98. 

"'Good  old  Ben  will  enjoy  it,  too,'  says  Alonzo; 
*  and,  furthermore,  Ben  will  straighten  out  one  or  two 
little  things  that  have  puzzled  me  about  this  poet.  He 
will  understand  his  complex  nature  in  a  way  that  I 
confess  I  have  been  unequal  to.  What  I  mean  is,'  he 
says,  'there  was  talk  when  I  left  this  morning  of  the 
poet  consenting  to  take  a  class  in  poetry  for  several 
weeks  in  our  thriving  little  city,  and  Henrietta  was 
urging  him  to  make  our  house  his  home.  I  have  a 
sort  of  feeling  that  Ben  will  be  able  to  make  several 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  19 

suggestions  of  prime  value.  I  have  never  known  him 
to  fail  at  making  suggestions.' 

"  Funny,  the  way  the  little  man  tried  to  put  it  over 
on  us,  letting  on  he  was  just  puzzled — not  really 
bothered,  as  he  plainly  was.  You  knew  Henrietta 
was  still  seeing  the  big  red  splash  of  Romance,  be 
hind  which  the  figure  of  her  husband  was  totally 
obscured.  Jeff  Tuttle  saw  the  facts,  and  he  up  and 
spoke  in  a  very  common  way  about  what  would 
quickly  happen  to  any  tramp  that  tried  to  camp  in  his 
house,  poet  or  no  poet,  but  that's  neither  here  nor 
there.  We  left  Alonzo  looking  cheerily  forward  to 
Ben  Sutton  on  the  eleven  forty-two,  and  I  went  on  to 
do  some  errands. 

"In  the  course  of  these  I  discovered  that  others 
besides  Henrietta  had  fell  hard  for  the  poet  of  Nature. 
I  met  Mrs.  Dr.  Percy  Hailey  Martingale  and  she  just 
bubbles  about  him,  she  having  been  at  the  Prices'  the 
night  before. 

"'Isn't  he  a  glorious  thing!'  she  says;  'and  how 
grateful  we  should  be  for  the  dazzling  bit  of  colour 
he  brings  into  our  drab  existence!'  She  is  a  good 
deal  like  that  herself  at  times.  And  I  met  Beryl 
Mae  Macomber,  a  well-known  young  society  girl  of 
seventeen,  and  Beryl  Mae  says:  'He's  awfully  good 
looking,  but  do  you  think  he's  sincere?'  And  even 
Mrs.  Judge  Ballard  comes  along  and  says:  'What  a 
stimulus  he  should  be  to  us  in  our  dull  lives !  How  he 
shows  us  the  big,  vital  bits!'  and  her  at  that  very 
minute  going  into  Bullitt  &  Fleishacker's  to  buy  shoes 


20  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

for  her  nine-year-old  twin  grandsons!  And  the 
Reverend  Mrs.  Wiley  Knapp  in  at  the  Racquet 
Store  wanting  to  know  if  the  poet  didn't  make  me 
think  of  some  wild,  free  creature  of  the  woods — a  deer 
or  an  antelope  poised  for  instant  flight  while  for  one 
moment  he  timidly  overlooked  man  in  his  hideous 
commercialism.  But,  of  course,  she  was  a  minister's 
wife.  I  said  he  made  me  feel  just  like  that.  I  said 
so  to  all  of  'em.  What  else  could  I  say?  If  I'd  said 
what  I  thought  there  on  the  street  I'd  of  been 
pinched.  So  I  beat  it  home  in  self -protection.  I 
was  sympathizing  good  and  hearty  with  Lon  Price  by 
that  time  and  looking  forward  to  Ben  Sutton  myself. 
I  had  a  notion  Ben  would  see  the  right  of  it  where 
these  poor  dubs  of  husbands  wouldn't — or  wouldn't 
dast  say  it  if  they  did. 

"About  five  o'clock  I  took  another  run  downtown 
for  some  things  I'd  forgot,  with  an  eye  out  to  see  how 
Alonzo  and  Ben  might  be  coming  on.  The  fact  is, 
seeing  each  other  only  once  a  year  that  way  they're 
apt  to  kind  of  loosen  up — if  you  know  what  I  mean. 

"No  sign  of  'em  at  first.  Nothing  but  ladies  young 
and  old — even  some  of  us  older  ranching  set — making 
final  purchases  of  ribbons  and  such  for  the  sole  benefit 
of  Wilfred  Lennox,  and  talking  in  a  flushed  manner 
about  him  whenever  they  met.  Almost  every 
darned  one  of  'em  had  made  it  a  point  to  stroll  past 
the  Price  mansion  that  afternoon  where  Wilfred  was 
setting  out  on  the  lawn  in  a  wicker  chair  with  some 
bottles  of  beer  surveying  Nature  with  a  look  of  lofty 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  21 

approval  and  chatting  with  Henrietta  about  the  real 
things  of  life. 

"Beryl  Mae  Macomber  had  traipsed  past  four 
times,  changing  her  clothes  twice  with  a  different 
shade  of  ribbon  across  her  forehead  and  all  her 
college  pins  on,  and  at  last  she'd  simply  walked  right 
in  and  asked  if  she  hadn't  left  her  tennis  racquet 
there  last  Tuesday.  She  says  to  Mrs.  Judge  Bal- 
lard  and  Mrs.  Martingale  and  me  in  the  Cut-Rate 
Pharmacy,  she  says :  '  Oh,  he's  just  awfully  magnetic 
— but  do  you  really  think  he's  sincere?'  Then  she 
bought  an  ounce  of  Breath  of  Orient  perfume  and 
kind  of  two-stepped  out.  These  other  ladies  spoke 
very  sharply  about  the  freedom  Beryl  Mae's  aunt 
allowed  her.  Mrs.  Martingale  said  the  poet,  it  was 
true,  had  a  compelling  personality,  but  what  was 
our  young  girls  coming  to?  And  if  that  child  was 
hers 

"So  I  left  these  two  lady  highbinders  and  went  on 
into  the  retail  side  of  the  Family  Liquor  Store  to 
order  up  some  cooking  sherry,  and  there  over  the 
partition  from  the  bar  side  what  do  I  hear  but 
Alonzo  Price  and  Ben  Sutton !  Right  off  I  could  tell 
they'd  been  pinning  a  few  on.  In  fact,  Alonzo  was 
calling  the  bartender  Mister.  You  don't  know  about 
Lon,  but  when  he  calls  the  bartender  Mister  the  ship 
has  sailed.  Ten  minutes  after  that  he'll  be  crying 
over  his  operation.  So  I  thought  quick,  remember 
ing  that  we  had  now  established  a  grillroom  at  the 
country  club,  consisting  of  a  bar  and  three  tables  with 


22  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

bells  on  them,  and  a  Chinaman,  and  that  if  Alonzo 
and  Ben  Sutton  come  there  at  all  they  had  better 
come  right — at  least  to  start  with.  When  I'd  given 
my  order  I  sent  Louis  Meyer  in  to  tell  the  two  gentle 
men  a  lady  wished  to  speak  to  them  outside. 

"In  a  minute  Ben  comes  out  alone.  He  was  awful 
glad  to  see  me  and  I  said  how  well  he  looked,  and  he 
did  look  well,  sort  of  cordial  and  bulging — his  fore 
head  bulges  and  his  eyes  bulge  and  his  moustache  and 
his  chin,  and  he  has  cushions  on  his  face.  He  beamed 
on  me  in  a  wide  and  hearty  manner  and  explained 
that  Alonzo  refused  to  come  out  to  meet  a  lady  until 
he  knew  who  she  was,  because  you  got  to  be  careful 
in  a  small  town  like  this  where  every  one  talks.  *  And 
besides,'  says  Ben,  'he's  just  broke  down  and  begun 
to  cry  about  his  appendicitis  that  was  three  years  ago. 
He's  leaning  his  head  on  his  arms  down  by  the  end  of 
the  bar  and  sobbing  bitterly  over  it.  He  seems  to 
grieve  about  it  as  a  personal  loss.  I've  tried  to  cheer 
him  up  and  told  him  it  was  probably  all  for  the  best, 
but  he  says  when  it  comes  over  him  this  way  he 
simply  can't  stand  it.  And  what  shall  I  do?' 

"Well,  of  course  I  seen  the  worst  had  happened 
with  Alonzo.  So  I  says  to  Ben:  'You  know  there's 
a  party  to-night  and  if  that  man  ain't  seen  to  he  will 
certainly  sink  the  ship.  Now  you  get  him  out  of  that 
swamp  and  I'll  think  of  something.'  'I'll  do  it,'  says 
Ben,  turning  sideways  so  he  could  go  through  the 
doorway  again.  Til  do  it,'  he  says,  'if  I  have  to  use 
force  on  the  little  scoundrel.' 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  23 

"And  sure  enough,  in  a  minute  he  edged  out  again 
with  Alonzo  firmly  fastened  to  him  in  some  way. 
Lon  hadn't  wanted  to  come  and  didn't  want  to  stay 
now,  but  he  simply  couldn't  move.  Say,  that  Ben 
Sutton  would  make  an  awful  grand  anchor  for  a  cap 
tive  balloon.  Alonzo  wiped  his  eyes  until  he  could  see 
who  I  was.  Then  I  rebuked  him,  reminding  him  of 
his  sacred  duties  as  a  prominent  citizen,  a  husband, 
and  the  secretary  of  the  Red  Gap  Chamber  of  Com 
merce.  'Of  course  it's  all  right  to  take  a  drink  now 
and  then,'  I  says. 

"Alonzo  brightened  at  this.  'Good!'  says  he; 
'now  it's  now  and  pretty  soon  it  will  be  then.  Let's 
go  into  a  saloon  or  something  like  that!' 

" '  You'll  come  with  me,'  I  says  firmly.  And  I 
inarched  'em  down  to  the  United  States  Grill,  where 
I  ordered  tea  and  toast  for  'em.  Ben  was  sensible 
enough,  but  Alonzo  was  horrified  at  the  thought  of 
tea.  'It's  tea  or  nice  cold  water  for  yours,'  I  says, 
and  that  set  him  off  again.  'Water!'  he  sobs. 
'  Water !  Water !  Maybe  you  don't  know  that  some 
dear  cousins  of  mine  have  just  lost  their  all  in  the 
Dayton  flood — twenty  years'  gathering  went  in  a 
minute,  just  like  that!'  and  he  tried  to  snap  his 
fingers.  All  the  same  I  got  some  hot  tea  into  him  and 
sent  for  Eddie  Pierce  to  be  out  in  front  with  his  hack. 
While  we  was  waiting  for  Eddie  it  occurs  to  Alonzo  to 
telephone  his  wife.  He  come  back  very  solemn  and 
says : '  I  told  her  I  wouldn't  be  home  to  dinner  because 
I  was  hungry  and  there  probably  wouldn't  be  enough 


•24  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

meat,  what  with  a  vegetarian  poet  in  the  house.  I 
told  her  I  should  sink  to  the  level  of  a  brute  in  the 
night  life  of  our  gay  little  city.  I  said  I  was  a  way 
ward  child  of  Nature  myself  if  you  come  right  down 
to  it.' 

"'Good  for  you,'  I  says,  having  got  word  that 
Eddie  is  outside  with  his  hack.  'And  now  for  the 
open  road!'  Tine!'  says  Alonzo.  'My  spirit  is 
certainly  feeling  very  untamed,  like  some  poet's!' 
So  I  hustled  'em  out  and  into  the  four-wheeler.  Then 
I  give  Eddie  Pierce  private  instructions.  'Get  'em 
out  into  the  hills  about  four  miles,'  I  says,  'out  past 
the  Catholic  burying  ground,  then  make  an  excuse 
that  your  hack  has  broke  down,  and  as  soon  as  they 
set  foot  to  the  ground  have  them  skates  of  yours  run 
away.  Pay  no  attention  whatever  to  their  pleadings 
or  their  profane  threats,  only  yelling  to  'em  that 
you'll  be  back  as  soon  as  possible.  But  don't  go 
back.  They'll  wait  an  hour  or  so,  then  walk.  And 
they  need  to  walk.' 

'You  said  something  there,'  says  Eddie,  glancing 
back  at  'em.  Ben  Sutton  was  trying  to  cheer  Alonzo 
up  by  reminding  him  of  the  Christmas  night  they 
went  to  sleep  in  the  steam  room  of  the  Turkish  bath 
at  Nome,  and  the  man  forgot  'em  and  shut  off  the 
steam  and  they  froze  to  the  benches  and  had  to  be 
chiselled  off.  And  Eddie  trotted  off  with  his  load. 
You'd  ought  to  seen  the  way  the  hack  sagged  down  on 
Ben's  side.  And  I  felt  that  I  had  done  a  good  work, 
so  I  hurried  home  to  get  a  bite  to  eat  and  dress  and 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  25 

make  the  party,  which  I  still  felt  would  be  a  good 
party  even  if  the  husband  of  our  hostess  was  among 
the  killed  or  missing. 

"  I  reached  the  clubhouse  at  eight  o'clock  of  that 
beautiful  June  evening,  to  find  the  party  already  well 
assembled  on  the  piazza  and  the  front  steps  or  stroll 
ing  about  the  lawn,  about  eight  or  ten  of  our  promi 
nent  society  matrons  and  near  as  many  husbands. 
And  mebbe  those  dames  hadn't  lingered  before  their 
mirrors  for  final  touches!  Mrs.  Martingale  had  on 
all  her  rings  and  the  jade  bracelet  and  the  art-craft 
necklace  with  amethysts,  and  Mrs.  Judge  Ballard 
had  done  her  hair  a  new  way,  and  Beryl  Mae  Ma- 
comber,  there  with  her  aunt,  not  only  had  a  new  scarf 
with  silver  stars  over  her  frail  young  shoulders  and  a 
band  of  cherry-coloured  velvet  across  her  forehead, 
but  she  was  wearing  the  first  ankle  watch  ever  seen  in 
Red  Gap.  I  couldn't  begin  to  tell  you  the  fussy  im 
provements  them  ladies  had  made  in  themselves — 
and  all,  mind  you,  for  the  passing  child  of  Nature 
who  had  never  paid  a  bill  for  'em  in  his  life. 

"  Oh,  it  was  a  gay,  careless  throng  with  the  mad 
light  of  pleasure  in  its  eyes,  and  all  of  'em  milling 
round  Wilfred  Lennox,  who  was  eating  it  up.  Some 
bantered  him  roguishly  and  some  spoke  in  chest 
tones  of  what  was  the  real  inner  meaning  of  life  after 
all.  Henrietta  Templeton  Price  hovered  near  with 
the  glad  light  of  capture  in  her  eyes.  Silent  but 
proud  Henrietta  was,  careless  but  superior,  remind 
ing  me  of  the  hunter  that  has  his  picture  taken  over  in 


26  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Africa  with  one  negligent  foot  on  the  head  of  a  two- 
horned  rhinoceros  he's  just  killed. 

"But  again  the  husbands  was  kind  of  lurking  in  the 
background,  bunched  up  together.  They  seemed 
abashed  by  this  strange  frenzy  of  their  womenfolks. 
How'd  they  know,  the  poor  dubs,  that  a  poet  wasn't 
something  a  business  man  had  ought  to  be  polite  and 
grovelling  to?  They  affected  an  easy  manner,  but  it 
was  poor  work.  Even  Judge  Ballard,  who  seems 
nine  feet  tall  in  his  Prince  Albert,  and  usually  looks 
quite  dignified  and  hostile  with  his  long  dark  face  and 
his  moustache  and  goatee — even  the  good  old  judge 
was  rattled  after  a  brief  and  unhappy  effort  to  hold  a 
bit  of  converse  with  the  guest  of  honour.  Him  and 
Jeff  Tuttle  went  to  the  grillroom  twice  in  ten  minutes. 
The  judge  always  takes  his  with  a  dash  of  pepper 
sauce  in  it,  but  now  it  only  seemed  to  make  him  more 
gloomy. 

"Well,  I  was  listening  along,  feeling  elated  that 
I'd  put  Alonzo  and  Ben  Sutton  out  of  the  way  and 
wondering  when  the  show  would  begin — Beryl  Mae 
in  her  high,  innocent  voice  had  just  said  to  the  poet: 
'But  seriously  now,  are  you  sincere?'  and  I  was  get 
ting  some  plenty  of  that,  when  up  the  road  in  the 
dusk  I  seen  Bush  Jones  driving  a  dray-load  of  furni 
ture.  I  wondered  where  in  time  any  family  could  be 
moving  out  that  way.  I  didn't  know  any  houses  be 
yond  the  club  and  I  was  pondering  about  this,  idly  as 
you  might  say>  when  Bush  Jones  pulls  his  team  up 
right  in  front  of  the  clubhouse,  and  there  on  the  load 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  27 

is  the  two  I  had  tried  to  lose.  In  a  big  armchair 
beside  a  varnished  centre  table  sits  Ben  Sutton  read 
ing  something  that  I  recognized  as  the  yellow  card 
with  Wilfred's  verses  on  it.  And  across  the  dray 
from  him  on  a  red-plush  sofa  is  Alonzo  Price  singing 
'  My  Wild  Irish  Rose'  in  a  very  noisy  tenor. 

"Well,  sir,  I  could  have  basted  that  fool  Bush 
Jones  with  one  of  his  own  dray  stakes.  That  man's 
got  an  intellect  just  powerful  enough  to  take  furni 
ture  from  one  house  to  another  if  the  new  address 
ain't  too  hard  for  him  to  commit  to  memory.  That's 
Bush  Jones  all  right!  He  has  the  machinery  for 
thinking,  but  it  all  glitters  as  new  as  the  day  it  was 
put  in.  So  he'd  come  a  mile  out  of  his  way  with 
these  two  riots — and  people  off  somewhere  wondering 
where  that  last  load  of  things  was! 

"The  ladies  all  affected  to  ignore  this  disgraceful 
spectacle,  with  Henrietta  sinking  her  nails  into  her 
bloodless  palms,  but  the  men  broke  out  and  cheered  a 
little  in  a  half-scared  manner  and  some  of  'em  went 
down  to  help  the  newcomers  climb  out.  Then  Ben 
had  words  with  Bush  Jones  because  he  wanted  him  to 
wait  there  and  take  'em  back  to  town  when  the  party 
was  over  and  Bush  refused  to  wait.  After  suffering 
about  twenty  seconds  in  the  throes  of  mental  effort  I 
reckon  he  discovered  that  he  had  business  to  attend 
to  or  was  hungry  or  something.  Anyway,  Ben  paid 
him  some  money  finally  and  he  drove  off  after  calling 
out  *  Good-night,  all!'  just  as  if  nothing  had  hap 
pened. 


28  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"Alonzo  and  Ben  Sutton  joined  the  party  without 
further  formality.  They  didn't  look  so  bad,  either, 
so  I  saw  my  crooked  work  had  done  some  good.  Lon 
quit  singing  almost  at  once  and  walked  good  and  his 
eyes  didn't  wabble,  and  he  looked  kind  of  desperate 
and  respectable,  and  Ben  was  first-class,  except  he 
was  slightly  oratorical  and  his  collar  had  melted  the 
way  fat  men's  do.  And  it  was  funny  to  see  how 
every  husband  there  bucked  up  when  Ben  came  for 
ward,  as  if  all  they  had  wanted  was  some  one  to  make 
medicine  for  'em  before  they  begun  the  war  dance. 
They  mooched  right  up  round  Ben  when  he  trampled 
a  way  into  the  flushed  group  about  Wilfred. 

"At  last  the  well-known  stranger!'  says  Ben 
cordially,  seizing  one  of  Wilfred's  pale,  beautiful 
hands.  'I've  been  hearing  so  much  of  you,  wayward 
child  of  the  open  road  that  you  are,  and  I've  just  been 
reading  your  wonderful  verses  as  I  sat  in  my  library. 
The  woods  and  the  hills  for  your  spirit  untamed  and 
the  fire  of  youth  to  warm  your  nights — that's  the 
talk.'  He  paused  and  waved  Wilfred's  verses  in  a 
fat,  freckled  hand.  Then  he  looked  at  him  hard  and 
peculiar  and  says:  'When  you  going  to  pull  some  of 
it  for  us?' 

"Wilfred  had  looked  slightly  rattled  from  the  be 
ginning.  Now  he  smiled,  but  only  with  his  lips — 
he  made  it  seem  like  a  mere  Swedish  exercise  or  some 
thing,  and  the  next  second  his  face  looked  as  if  it  had 
been  sewed  up  for  the  winter. 

"'Little  starry-eyed  gypsy,  I  say,  when  are  you 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  29 

going  to  pull  some  of  that  open-road  stuff?'  says  Ben 
again,  all  cordial  and  sinister. 

"Wilfred  gulped  and  tried  to  be  jaunty.  'Oh,  as 
to  that,  I'm  here  to-day  and  there  to-morrow/  he 
murmurs,  and  nervously  fixes  his  necktie. 

" 'Oh,  my,  and  isn't  that  nice!'  says  Ben  heartily — • 
'the  urge  of  the  wild  to  her  wayward  child' — I 
know  you're  a  slave  to  it.  And  now  you're  going  to 
tell  us  all  about  the  open  road,  and  then  you  and  I  are 
going  to  have  an  intimate  chat  and  I'll  tell  you 
about  it — about  some  of  the  dearest  little  open  roads 
you  ever  saw,  right  round  in  these  parts.  I've  just 
counted  nine,  all  leading  out  of  town  to  the  cunning- 
est  mountains  and  glens  that  would  make  you  write 
poetry  hours  at  a  time,  with  Nature's  glad  fruits  and 
nuts  and  a  mug  of  spring  water  and  some  bottled  beer 
and  a  ham  and  some  rump  steak ' 

"The  stillness  of  that  group  had  become  darned 
painful,  I  want  to  tell  you.  There  was  a  horrid  fear 
that  Ben  Sutton  might  go  too  far,  even  for  a  country 
club.  Every  woman  was  shuddering  and  smiling  in  a 
painful  manner,  and  the  men  regarding  Ben  with 
glistening  eyes.  And  Ben  felt  it  himself  all  at  once. 
So  he  says:  'But  I  fear  I  am  detaining  you,'  and  let 
go  of  the  end  of  Wilfred's  tie  that  he  had  been  toying 
with  in  a  somewhat  firm  manner.  'Let  us  be  on 
with  your  part  of  the  evening's  entertainment,'  he 
says,  'but  don't  forget,  gypsy  wilding  that  you  are, 
that  you  and  I  must  have  a  chat  about  open  roads  the 
moment  you  have  finished.  I  know  we  are  cramping 


30  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

you.  By  that  time  you  will  be  feeling  the  old,  rest 
less  urge  and  you  might  take  a  road  that  wasn't  open 
if  I  didn't  direct  you.' 

"He  patted  Wilfred  loudly  on  the  back  a  couple  of 
times  and  Wilfred  ducked  the  third  pat  and  got  out 
of  the  group,  and  the  ladies  all  began  to  flurry  their 
voices  about  the  lovely  June  evening  but  wouldn't  it 
be  pleasanter  inside,  and  Henrietta  tragically  called 
from  the  doorway  to  come  at  once,  for  God's  sake, 
so  they  all  went  at  once,  with  the  men  only  half  trail 
ing,  and  inside  we  could  hear  'em  fixing  chairs  round 
and  putting  out  a  table  for  the  poet  to  stand  by,  and 
so  forth. 

"Alonzo,  however,  had  not  trailed.  He  was  over 
on  the  steps  holding  Beryl  Mae  Macomber  by  her 
new  scarf  and  telling  her  how  flowerlike  her  beauty 
was.  And  old  Judge  Ballard  was  holding  about  half 
the  men,  including  Ben  Sutton,  while  he  made  a 
speech.  I  hung  back  to  listen.  'Sir,'  he  was  saying 
to  Ben,  'Secretary  Seward  some  years  since  pur 
chased  your  territory  from  Russia  for  seven  million 
dollars  despite  the  protests  of  a  clamorous  and 
purblind  opposition.  How  niggardly  seems  that  pur 
chase  price  at  this  moment!  For  Alaska  has  per 
fected  you,  sir,  if  it  did  not  produce  you.  Gentle 
men,  I  feel  that  we  dealt  unfairly  by  Russia.  But 
that  is  in  the  dead  past.  It  is  not  too  late,  however, 
to  tiptoe  to  the  grillroom  and  offer  a  toast  to  our 
young  sister  of  the  snows.' 

"There  was  subdued  cheers  and  they  tiptoed.    Ben 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  31 

Sutton  was  telling  the  judge  that  he  felt  highly  com 
plimented,  but  it  was  a  mistake  to  ring  in  that  snow 
stuff  on  Alaska.  She'd  suffered  from  it  too  long.  He 
was  going  on  to  paint  Alaska  as  something  like  Ala 
bama — cooler  nights,  of  course,  but  bracing.  Alonzo 
still  had  Beryl  Mae  by  the  scarf,  telling  her  how  flower- 
like  her  beauty  was. 

"I  went  into  the  big  room,  picking  a  chair  over  by 
the  door  so  I  could  keep  tabs  on  that  grillroom.  Only 
three  or  four  of  the  meekest  husbands  had  come  with 
us.  And  Wilfred  started.  I'll  do  him  the  justice 
to  say  he  was  game.  The  ladies  thought  anything 
bordering  on  roughness  was  all  over,  but  Wilfred 
didn't.  When  he'd  try  to  get  a  far-away  look  in  his 
eyes  while  he  was  reciting  his  poetry  he  couldn't  get 
it  any  farther  away  than  the  grillroom  door.  He  was 
nervous  but  determined,  for  there  had  been  notice 
given  of  a  silver  offering  for  him.  He  recited  the 
verses  on  the  card  and  the  ladies  all  thrilled  up  at 
once,  including  Beryl  Mae,  who'd  come  in  without 
her  scarf.  They  just  clenched  their  hands  and  hung 
on  Wilfred's  wild,  free  words. 

"And  after  the  poetry  he  kind  of  lectured  about 
how  man  had  ought  to  break  away  from  the  vile 
cities  and  seek  the  solace  of  great  Mother  Nature, 
where  his  bruised  spirit  could  be  healed  and  the 
veneer  of  civilization  cast  aside  and  the  soul  come 
into  its  own,  and  things  like  that.  And  he  went  on  to 
say  that  out  in  the  open  the  perspective  of  life  is 
broadened  and  one  is  a  laughing  philosopher  as  long 


32  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

as  the  blue  sky  is  overhead  and  the  green  grass 
underfoot.  'To  lie/  says  he,  'with  relaxed  muscles 
on  the  carpet  of  pine  needles  and  look  up  through  the 
gently  swaying  branches  of  majestic  trees  at  the 
fleecy  white  clouds,  dreaming  away  the  hours  far 
from  the  sordid  activities  of  the  market  place,  is  one 
of  the  best  nerve  tonics  in  all  the  world.'  It  was  an 
unfortunate  phrase  for  Wilfred,  because  some  of  the 
husbands  had  tiptoed  out  of  the  grillroom  to  listen, 
and  there  was  a  hearty  cheer  at  this,  led  by  Jeff 
Tuttle.  'Sure!  Some  nerve  tonic!5  they  called  out, 
and  laughed  coarsely.  Then  they  rushed  back  to  the 
grillroom  without  tiptoeing. 

"The  disgraceful  interruption  was  tactfully  cov 
ered  by  Wilfred  and  his  audience.  He  took  a  sip 
from  the  glass  of  water  and  went  on  to  talk  about  the 
world's  debt  to  poetry.  Then  I  sneaked  out  to  the 
grillroom  myself.  By  this  time  the  Chinaman  had 
got  tangled  up  with  the  orders  and  was  putting  out 
drinks  every  which  way.  And  they  was  being  taken 
willingly.  Judge  Ballard  and  Ben  Sutton  was  now 
planting  cotton  in  Alaska  and  getting  good  crops 
every  year,  and  Ben  was  also  promising  to  send  the 
judge  a  lovely  spotted  fawnskin  vest  that  an  Indian 
had  made  for  him,  but  made  too  small — not  having 
more  than  six  or  eight  fawns,  I  judged.  And  Alonzo 
had  got  a  second  start.  Still  he  wasn't  so  bad  yet, 
with  Beryl  Mae's  scarf  over  his  arm,  and  talking  of 
the  unparalleled  beauties  of  Price's  Addition  to  Red 
Gap,  which  he  said  he  wouldn't  trade  even  for  the 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  33 

whole  of  Alaska  if  it  was  offered  to  him  to-morrow — 
not  that  Ben  Sutton  wasn't  the  whitest  soul  God  ever 
made  and  he'd  like  to  hear  some  one  say  different — 
and  so  on. 

"I  mixed  in  with  'em  and  took  a  friendly  drink 
myself,  with  the  aim  of  smoothing  things  down,  but  I 
saw  it  would  be  delicate  work.  About  all  I  could  do 
was  keep  'em  reminded  there  was  ladies  present  and 
it  wasn't  a  barroom  where  anything  could  be  rightly 
started.  Doc  Martingale's  feelings  was  running  high, 
too,  account,  I  suppose,  of  certain  full-hearted  things 
his  wife  had  blurted  out  to  him  about  the  hypnotic 
eyes  of  this  here  Nature  lover.  He  was  quiet  enough, 
but  vicious,  acting  like  he'd  love  to  do  some  dental 
work  on  the  poet  that  might  or  might  not  be  pain 
less  for  all  he  cared  a  hoot.  He  was  taking  his 
own  drinks  all  alone,  like  clockwork — moody  but 
systematic. 

"Then  we  hear  chairs  pushed  round  in  the  other 
room  and  the  chink  of  silver  to  be  offered  to  the  poet, 
and  Henrietta  come  out  to  give  word  for  the  refresh 
ments  to  be  served.  She  found  Alonzo  in  the  hall 
way  telling  Beryl  Mae  how  flowerlike  her  beauty  was 
and  giving  her  the  elk's  tooth  charm  off  his  watch 
chain.  Beryl  Mae  was  giggling  heartily  until  she 
caught  Henrietta's  eye — like  a  cobra's. 

"The  refreshments  was  handed  round  peaceful 
enough,  with  the  ladies  pressing  sardine  sandwiches 
and  chocolate  cake  and  cups  of  coffee  on  to  Wilfred 
and  asking  him  interesting  questions  about  his  ad- 


34  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

venturous  life  in  the  open.  And  the  plans  was  all 
made  for  his  class  in  poetry  to  be  held  at  Henrietta's 
house,  where  the  lady  subscribers  for  a  few  weeks 
could  come  into  contact  with  the  higher  realities  of 
life,  at  eight  dollars  for  the  course,  and  Wilfred  was 
beginning  to  cheer  up  again,  though  still  subject  to 
dismay  when  one  of  the  husbands  would  glare  in  at 
him  from  the  hall,  and  especially  when  Ben  Sutton 
would  look  in  with  his  bulging  and  expressive  eyes 
and  kind  of  bark  at  him. 

"Then  Ben  Sutton  come  and  stood  in  the  doorway 
till  he  caught  Wilfred's  eye  and  beckoned  to  him. 
Wilfred  pretended  not  to  notice  the  first  time,  but 
Ben  beckoned  a  little  harder,  so  Wilfred  excused  him 
self  to  the  six  or  eight  ladies  and  went  out.  It 
seemed  to  me  he  first  looked  quick  round  him  to  make 
sure  there  wasn't  any  other  way  out.  I  was  standing 
in  the  hall  when  Ben  led  him  tenderly  into  the  grill 
room  with  two  fingers. 

"'Here  is  our  well-known  poet  and  bon  vivantS 
says  Ben  to  Alonzo,  who  had  followed  'em  in.  So 
Alonzo  bristles  up  to  Wilfred  and  glares  at  him  and 
says:  'All  joking  aside,  is  that  one  of  my  new  shirts 
you're  wearing  or  is  it  not?' 

"Wilfred  gasped  a  couple  times  and  says:  'WTiy, 
as  to  that,  you  see,  the  madam  insisted ' 

"Alonzo  shut  him  off.  'How  dare  you  drag  a 
lady's  name  into  a  barroom  brawl?'  says  he. 

"  '  Don't  shoot  in  here,'  says  Ben.  '  You'd  scare  the 
ladies.' 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  35 

"Wilfred  went  pasty,  indeed,  thinking  his  host  was 
going  to  gun  him. 

"'Oh,  very  well,  I  won't  then,'  says  Alonzo.  'I 
guess  I  can  be  a-gentleman  when  necessary.  But  all 
joking  aside,  I  want  to  ask  him  this:  Does  he  con 
sider  poetry  to  be  an  accomplishment  or  a  vice?' 

"'I  was  going  to  put  something  like  that  to  him 
myself,  only  I  couldn't  think  of  it,'  says  Doc  Martin 
gale,  edging  up  and  looking  quite  restrained  and 
nervous  in  the  arms.  I  was  afraid  of  the  doc.  I  was 
afraid  he  was  going  to  blemish  Wilfred  a  couple  of 
times  right  there. 

"'An  accomplishment  or  a  vice?  Answer  yes  or 
no!'  orders  the  judge  in  a  hard  voice. 

uThe  poet  looks  round  at  'em  and  attempts  to 
laugh  merrily,  but  he  only  does  it  from  the  teeth  out. 

"'Laugh  on,  my  proud  beauty!'  says  Ben  Sutton. 
Then  he  turns  to  the  bunch.  '  What  we  really  ought 
to  do,'  he  says,  *  we  ought  to  make  a  believer  of  him 
right  here  and  now.' 

"Even  then,  mind  you,  the  husbands  would  have 
lost  their  nerve  if  Ben  hadn't  took  the  lead.  Ben 
didn't  have  to  live  with  their  wives  so  what  cared  he? 
Wilfred  Lennox  sort  of  shuffled  his  feet  and  smiled  a 
smile  of  pure  anxiety.  He  knew  some  way  that  this 
was  nothing  to  cheer  about. 

" '  I  got  it,'  says  Jeff  Tutt'le  with  the  air  of  a  thinker. 
'  We're  cramping  the  poor  cuss  here.  What  he  wants 
is  the  open  road.' 

"'What  he  really  wants,'  says  Alonzo,  'is  about 


36  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

six  bottles  of  my  pure,  sparkling  beer,  but  maybe  he'll 
take  the  open  road  if  we  show  him  a  good  one.' 

" '  He  wants  the  open  road — show  him  a  good  one ! ' 
yells  the  other  husbands  in  chorus.  It  was  kind  of 
like  a  song. 

"  'I  had  meant  to  be  on  my  way,'  says  Wilfred  very 
cold  and  lofty. 

"'  You're  here  to-day  and  there  to-morrow,'  says 
Ben;  'but  how  can  you  be  there  to-morrow  if  you 
don't  start  from  here  now? — for  the  way  is  long  and 
lonely.' 

"'I  was  about  to  start,'  says  Wilfred,  getting  in  a 
couple  of  steps  toward  the  door. 

" '  'Tis  better  so,'  says  Ben.  '  This  is  no  place  for  a 
county  recorder's  son,  and  there's  a  bully  road  out 
here  open  at  both  ends.' 

"They  made  way  for  the  poet,  and  a  sickening 
silence  reigned.  Even  the  women  gathered  about 
the  door  of  the  other  room  was  silent.  They  knew 
the  thing  had  got  out  of  their  hands.  The  men  closed 
in  after  Wilfred  as  he  reached  the  steps.  He  there 
took  his  soft  hat  out  from  under  his  coat  where  he'd 
cached  it.  He  went  cautiously  down  the  steps. 
Beryl  Mae  broke  the  silence. 

"'Oh,  Mr.  Price,'  says  she,  catching  Alonzo  by  the 
sleeve,  'do  you  think  he's  really  sincere?' 

"'He  is  at  this  moment,'  says  Alonzo.  'He's  be- 
kaving  as  sincerely  as  ever  I  saw  a  man  behave.'  And 
just  then  at  the  foot  of  the  steps  Wilfred  made  a 
tactical  error.  He  started  to  run..;  The  husbands 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  37 

and  Ben  Sutton  gave  the  long  yell  and  went  in  pur 
suit.  Wilfred  would  have  left  them  all  if  he  hadn't 
run  into  the  tennis  net.  He  come  down  like  a  sack  of 
meal. 

"'There!'  says  Ben  Sutton.  'Now  he's  done  it — 
broke  his  neck  or  something.  That's  the  way  with 
some  men — they'll  try  anything  to  get  a  laugh.' 

"They  went  and  picked  the  poet  up.  He  was  all 
right,  only  dazed. 

"'But  that's  one  of  the  roads  that  ain't  open,'  says 
Ben.  'And  besides,  you  was  going  right  toward  the 
nasty  old  railroad  that  runs  into  the  cramped  haunts 
of  men.  You  must  have  got  turned  round.  Here ' — 
he  pointed  out  over  the  golf  links — 'it's  off  that 
way  that  Mother  Nature  awaits  her  wayward  child. 
Miles  and  miles  of  her — all  open.  Doesn't  your 
gypsy  soul  hear  the  call?  This  way  for  the  hills  and 
glens,  thou  star-eyed  woodling!'  and  he  gently  led 
Wilfred  off  over  the  links,  the  rest  of  the  men  trailing 
after  and  making  some  word  racket,  believe  me. 
They  was  all  good  conversationalists  at  the  moment. 
Doc  Martingale  was  wanting  the  poet  to  run  into  the 
tennis  net  again,  just  for  fun,  and  Jeff  Tuttle  says 
make  him  climb  a  tree  like  the  monkeys  do  in  their 
native  glades,  but  Ben  says  just  keep  him  away  from 
the  railroad,  that's  all.  Good  Mother  Nature  will 
attend  to  the  rest. 

"  The  wives  by  now  was  huddled  round  the  side  of 
the  clubhouse,  too  scared  to  talk  much,  just  mutter 
ing  incoherently  and  wringing  their  hands,  and  Beryl 


38  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Mae  pipes  up  and  says :  '  Oh,  perhaps  I  wronged  him 
after  all;  perhaps  deep  down  in  his  heart  he  was 


sincere.' 


"The  moon  had  come  up  now  and  we  could  see  the 
mob  with  its  victim  starting  off  toward  the  Canadian 
Rockies.  Then  all  at  once  they  began  to  run,  and  I 
knew  Wilfred  had  made  another  dash  for  liberty. 
Pretty  soon  they  scattered  out  and  seemed  to  be  beat 
ing  up  the  shrubbery  down  by  the  creek.  And  after 
a  bit  some  of  'em  straggled  back.  They  paid  no  at 
tention  to  us  ladies,  but  made  for  the  grillroom. 

f '  We  lost  him  in  that  brush  beyond  the  fifth  hole,' 
says  Alonzo.  'None  of  us  is  any  match  for  him  on 
level  ground,  but  we  got  some  good  trackers  and 
we're  guarding  the  line  to  keep  him  headed  off  from 
the  railroad  and  into  his  beloved  hills.' 

"'We  should  hurry  back  with  refreshment  for  the 
faithful  watchers,'  says  Judge  Ballard.  'The  fellow 
will  surely  try  to  double  back  to  the  railroad.' 

' '  Got  to  keep  him  away  from  the  cramped  haunts 
of  business  men,'  says  Alonzo  brightly. 

"'I  wish  Clay,  my  faithful  old  hound,  were  still 
alive,'  says  the  judge  wistfully. 

"'Say,  I  got  a  peach  of  a  terrier  down  to  the  house 
right  now,'  says  Jeff  Tuttle,  'but  he's  only  trained  for 
bear — I  never  tried  him  on  poets.' 

"  'He  might  tree  him  at  that,'  says  Doc  Martingale. 

"'Percy,'  cries  his  wife,  'have  you  forgottem  your 
manhood?' 

'Yes,'  says  Percy. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  39 

"'Darling,'  calls  Henrietta,  'will  you  listen  to 
reason  a  moment?' 

"  'No,'  says  Alonzo. 

"  'It's  that  creature  from  Alaska  leading  them 
on,'  says  Mrs.  Judge  Ballard — 'that  overdressed 
drunken  rowdy!' 

"Ben  Sutton  looked  right  hurt  at  this.  He  but 
toned  his  coat  over  his  checked  vest  and  says:  'I 
take  that  unkindly,  madam — calling  me  over 
dressed.  I  selected  this  suiting  with  great  care. 
It  ain't  nice  to  call  me  overdressed.  I  feel  it 
deeply.' 

"But  they  was  off  again  before  one  thing  could 
lead  to  another,  taking  bottles  of  hard  liquor  they 
had  uncorked.  'The  open  road!  The  open  road!' 
they  yelled  as  they  went. 

"Well,  that's  about  all.  Some  of  the  wives  begun 
to  straggle  off  home,  mostly  in  tears,  and  some  hung 
round  till  later.  I  was  one  of  these,  not  wishing  to 
miss  anything  of  an  absorbing  character.  Edgar 
Tomlinson  went  early,  too.  Edgar  writes  'The  Loun 
ger  in  the  Lobby'  column  for  the  Recorder,  and  he'd 
come  out  to  report  the  entertainment;  but  at  one 
o'clock  he  said  it  was  a  case  for  the  sporting  editor 
and  he'd  try  to  get  him  out  before  the  kill. 

"At  different  times  one  or  two  of  the  hunters 
would  straggle  back  for  more  drink.  They  said  the 
quarry  was  making  a  long  detour  round  their  left 
flank,  trying  his  darndest  to  get  to  the  railroad,  but 
they  had  hopes.  And  they  scattered  out.  Ever 


40  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

and  anon  you  would  hear  the  long  howl  of  some  lone 
drunkard  that  had  got  lost  from  the  pack. 

"About  sunup  they  all  found  themselves  at  the 
railroad  track  about  a  mile  beyond  the  clubhouse, 
just  at  the  head  of  S  tender's  grade.  There  they  was 
voting  to  picket  the  track  for  a  mile  each  way  when 
along  come  the  four-thirty-two  way  freight.  It  had 
slowed  up  some  making  the  grade,  and  while  they 
watched  it  what  should  dart  out  from  a  bunch  of 
scrub  oak  but  the  active  figure  of  Wilfred  Lennox. 
He  made  one  of  them  iron  ladders  all  right  and  was  on 
top  of  a  car  when  the  train  come  by,  but  none  of 
'em  dast  jump  it  because  it  had  picked  up  speed 
again. 

"They  said  Wilfred  stood  up  and  shook  both  fists 
at  'em  and  called  'em  every  name  he  could  lay  his 
tongue  to — using  language  so  coarse  you'd  never 
think  it  could  have  come  from  a  poet's  lips.  They 
could  see  his  handsome  face  working  violently  long 
after  they  couldn't  hear  him.  Just  my  luck!  I'm 
always  missing  something. 

"So  they  come  grouching  back  to  the  clubhouse 
and  I  took  'em  home  to  breakfast.  When  we  got 
down  to  the  table  old  Judge  Ballard  says:  'What 
might  have  been  an  evening  of  rare  enjoyment  was 
converted  into  a  detestable  failure  by  that  cur.  I 
saw  from  the  very  beginning  that  he  was  determined 
to  spoil  our  fun.' 

"  'The  joke  is  sure  on  us,'  says  Ben  Sutton,  'but 
I  bear  him  no  grudge.  In  fact,  I  did  him  an  injustice. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  41 

I  knew  he  wasn't  a  poet,  but  I  didn't  believe  he  was 
even  a  hobo  till  he  jumped  that  freight.' 

"Alonzo  was  out  in  the  hall  telephoning  Henrietta. 
We  could  hear  his  cheerful  voice:  'No,  Pettikins,  no! 
It  doesn't  ache  a  bit.  What's  that?  Of  course  I  still 
do!  You  are  the  only  woman  that  ever  meant  any 
thing  to  me.  What?  What's  that?  Oh,  I  may 
have  errant  fancies  now  and  again,  like  the  best  of 
men — you  know  yourself  how  sensitive  I  am  to  a 
certain  type  of  flowerlike  beauty — but  it  never 
touches  my  deeper  nature.  Yes,  certainly,  I  shall  be 
right  up  the  very  minute  good  old  Ben  leaves — to 
morrow  or  next  day.  What's  that?  Now,  now! 
Don't  do  that!  Just  the  minute  he  leaves — G'-by.' 

"And  the  little  brute  hung  up  on  her!" 


n 

MA  PETTINGILL  AND  THE 
SONG  OF  SONGS 

THE  hammock  between  the  two  jack  pines  at 
the  back  of  the  Arrowhead  ranch  house  had 
lured  me  to  mid-afternoon  slumber.     The 
day  was  hot  and  the  morning  had  been  toilsome — 
four  miles  of  trout  stream,  rocky,  difficult  miles.    And 
my   hostess,   Mrs.   Lysander  John   Pettengill,   had 
ridden  off  after  luncheon  to  some  remote  fastness 
of  her  domain,  leaving  me  and  the  place  somno 
lent. 

In  the  shadowed  coolness,  aching  gratefully  in 
many  joints,  I  had  plunged  into  the  hammock's 
Lethe,  swooning  shamelessly  to  a  benign  oblivion. 
Dreamless  it  must  long  have  been,  for  the  shadows 
of  ranch  house,  stable,  hay  barn,  corral,  and  bunk 
house  were  long  to  the  east  when  next  I  observed 
them.  But  I  fought  to  this  wakefulness  through  one 
of  those  dreams  of  a  monstrous  futility  that  some 
times  madden  us  from  sleep.  Through  a  fearsome 
gorge  a  stream  wound  and  in  it  I  hunted  one  certain 
giant  trout.  Savagely  it  took  the  fly,  but  always  the 
line  broke  when  I  struck;  rather,  it  dissolved;  there 
would  be  no  resistance.  And  the  giant  fish  mocked 

4$ 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  43 

me  each  time,  jeered  and  flouted  m.e,  came  brazenly 
to  the  surface  and  derided  me  with  antics  weirdly 
human. 

Then,  as  I  persisted,  it  surprisingly  became  a 
musical  trout.  It  whistled,  it  played  a  guitar,  it 
sang.  How  pathetic  our  mildly  amazed  acceptance 
of  these  miracles  in  dreams !  I  was  only  the  more  de 
termined  to  snare  a  fish  that  could  whistle  and  sing 
simultaneously,  and  accompany  itself  on  a  stringed 
instrument,  and  was  six  feet  in  length.  It  was  that  by 
now  and.  ever  growing.  It  seemed  only  an  attractive 
novelty  and  I  still  believed  a  brown  hackle  would 
suffice.  But  then  I  became  aware  that  this  trout,  to 
its  stringed  accompaniment,  ever  whistled  and  sang 
one  song  with  a  desperate  intentness.  That  song  was 
"The  Rosary."  The  fish  had  presumed  too  far. 
"This,"  I  shrewdly  told  myself,  "is  almost  certainly 
a  df  earn."  The  soundless  words  were  magic.  Gorge 
and  stream  vanished,  the  versatile  fish  faded  to  blue 
sky  showing  through  the  green  needles  of  a  jack  pine. 
It  was  a  sane  world  again  and  still,  I  thought, 
with  the  shadows  of  ranch  house,  stable,  hay 
barn,  corral,  and  bunk  house  going  long  to  the 
east.  I  stretched  in  the  hammock.  I  tingled  with 
a  lazy  well-being.  The  world  w*as  still;  but  was  it — 
quite? 

On  a  bench  over  by  the  corral  gate  crouched  Buck 
Devine,  doing  something  needful  to  a  saddle.  And 
as  he  wrought  he  whistled.  He  whistled  "The  Rosary" 
shrilly  and  with  much  feeling.  Nor  was  the  world 


44  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

still  but  for  this.  From  the  bunk  house  came  the 
mellow  throbbing  of  a  stringed  instrument,  the  guitar 
,of  Sandy  Sawtelle,  star  rider  of  the  Arrowhead,  tem 
porarily  withdrawn  from  a.  career  of  sprightly  en 
deavour  by  a  sprained  ankle  and  solacing  lu's  retire 
ment  with  music.  He  was  playing  "  The  Rosary" — 
very  badly  indeed,  but  one  knew  only  too  well  what 
he  meant.  The  two  performers  were  distant  enough 
to  be  no  affront  to  each  other.  The  hammock,  less 
happily,  was  midway  between  them. 

I  sat  up  with  groans.  I  hated  to  leave  the  ham 
mock. 

"The  trout  also  sang  it,"  I  reminded  myself. 
Followed  the  voice,  a  voice  from  the  stable,  the 
cracked,  whining  tenor  of  a  very  aged  vassal  of  the 
Arrowhead,  one  Jimmie  Time.  Jimmie,  I  gathered, 
was  currying  a  horse  as  he  sang,  for  each  bar  of  the 
ballad  was  measured  by  the  double  thud  of  a  curry 
comb  against  the  side  of  a  stall.  Whistle,  guitar,  and 
voice  now  attacked  the  thing  in  differing  keys  and  at 
varying  points.  Jimmie  might  be  said  to  prevail. 
There  was  a  fatuous  tenderness  in  his  attack  and  the 
thudding  currycomb  gave  it  spirit.  Nor  did  he  slur 
any  of  the  affecting  words;  they  clave  the  air  with  an 
unctuous  precision: 

The  ow-wurs  I  spu-hend  with  thu-hee,  dee-yur  heart, 

(The  currycomb:  Thud,  thud!) 
Are  as  a  stru-hing  of  pur-rulls  tuh  me-e-e, 

(The  currycomb:  Thud,  thud!) 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  45 

Came  a  dramatic  and  equally  soulful  interpolation: 
"Whoa,    dang    you!     You    wt>uld,    would    you? 
Whoa-a-a,  now!" 
Again  the  melody : 

/  count  them  o-vurr,  ev-ry  one  apar-rut, 

(Thud,  thud!) 
M y  ro-sah-ree — my  ro-sah-ree! 

(Thud,  thud!) 

Buck  Devine  still  mouthed  his  woful  whistle  and 
Sandy  Sawtelle  valiantly  strove  for  the  true  and  just 
accord  of  his  six  strings.  It  was  no  place  for  a 
passive  soul.  I  parted  swiftly  from  the  hammock 
and  made  over  the  sun-scorched  turf  for  the  ranch 
house.  There  was  shelter  and  surcease;  doors  and 
windows  might  be  closed.  The  unctuous  whine  of 
Jimmie  Time  pursued  me: 

Each  ow-wur  a  pur-rull,  each  pur-rull  a  prayer, 

(Thud,  thud!) 
Tuh  stu-hill  a  heart  in  absence  wru-hung, 

(Thud,  thud!) 

As  I  reached  the  hospitable  door  of  the  living-room 
I  observed  Lew  Wee,  Chinese  chef  of  the  Arrowhead, 
engaged  in  cranking  one  of  those  devices  with  a 
musical  intention  which  I  have  somewhere  seen  ad 
vertised.  It  is  an  important-looking  device  in  a 
polished  mahogany  case,  and  I  recall  in  the  advertise 
ment  I  saw  it  was  surrounded  by  a  numerous  en- 


46  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

thralled-looking  family  in  a  costly  drawing-room, 
while  the  ghost  of  Beethoven  simpered  above  it  in 
ineffable  benignancy.  Something  now  told  me  the 
worst,  even  as  Lew  Wee  adjusted  the  needle  to  the  re 
volving  disk.  I  waited  for  no  more  than  the  open 
ing  orchestral  strains.  It  is  a  leisurely  rhythmed 
cacophony,  and  I  had  time  to  be  almost  beyond  range 
ere  the  voice  took  up  a  tale  I  was  hearing  too  often  in 
one  day.  Even  so  I  distantly  perceived  it  to  be  a 
fruity  contralto  voice  with  an  expert  sob. 

A  hundred  yards  in  front  of  the  ranch  house  all  was 
holy  peace,  peace  in  the  stilled  air,  peace  dreaming 
along  the  neighbouring  hills  and  lying  like  a  bene 
diction  over  the  wide  river-flat  below  me,  through 
which  the  stream  wove  a  shining  course.  I  exulted 
in  it,  from  the  dangers  passed.  Then  appeared  Mrs. 
Lysander  John  Pettengill  from  the  fringe  of  cotton- 
woods,  jolting  a  tired  horse  toward  me  over  the  flat. 

"Come  have  some  tea,"  she  cordially  boomed  as 
she  passed.  I  returned  uncertainly.  Tea?  Yes. 

But However,  the  door  would  be  shut  and  the 

Asiatic  probably  diverted. 

As  I  came  again  to  the  rear  of  the  ranch  house  Mrs. 
Pettengill,  in  khaki  riding  breeches,  flannel  shirt,  and 
the  hat  of  her  trade,  towered  bulkily  as  an  admirable 
figure  of  wrath,  one  hand  on  her  hip,  one  poising 
a  quirt  viciously  aloft.  By  the  corral  gate  Buck 
Devine  drooped  cravenly  above  his  damaged  saddle; 
at  the  door  of  the  bunk  house  Sandy  Sawtelle  tottered 
precariously  on  one  foot,  his  guitar  under  his  arm,  a 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  47 

look  of  guilty  horror  on  his  set  face.  By  the  stable 
door  stood  the  incredibly  withered  Jimmie  Time, 
shrinking  a  vast  dismay. 

"You  hear  me!"  exploded  the  infuriated  chate 
laine,  and  I  knew  she  was  repeating  the  phrase. 

"Ain't  I  got  to  mend  this  latigo?"  protested  Buck 
Devine  piteously. 

"You'll  go  up  the  gulch  and  beyond  the  dry  fork 
and  mend  it,  if  you  whistle  that  tune  again!" 

Sandy  Sawtelle  rumpled  his  pink  hair  to  further 
disorder  and  found  a  few  weak  words  for  his  con 
scious  guilt. 

"Now,  I  wasn't  aiming  to  harm  anybody,  what  with 
with  my  game  laig  and  shet  up  here  like  I  am " 

"Well,  my  Lord!  Can't  you  play  a  sensible  tune 
then?" 

Jimmie  Time  hereupon  behaved  craftily.  He 
lifted  his  head,  showing  the  face  of  a  boy  who  had 
somehow  got  to  be  seventy  years  old  without  ever 
getting  to  be  more  than  a  boy,  and  began  to  whistle 
softly  and  innocently — an  air  of  which  hardly  any 
thing  could  be  definitely  said  except  that  it  was  not 
"The  Rosary."  It  was  very  flagrantly  not  "The  Ros 
ary."  His  craft  availed  him  not. 

"Yes,  and  you,  too!"  thundered  the  lady.  "You 
was  the  worst — you  was  singing.  Didn't  I  hear  you? 
How  many  times  I  got  to  tell  you?  First  thing  you 
know,  you  little  reprobate " 

Jimmie  Time  cowered  again.  Visibly  he  took  on 
unbetterable  years. 


48  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"Yes,  ma'am,"  he  whispered. 

"Yes,  ma'am,"  meekly  echoed  the  tottering  in 
strumentalist. 

"Yes,  ma'am,"  muttered  Buck  Devine,  "not 
knowing  you  was  anywheres  near " 

"Makes  no  difference  where  I  be — you  hear  me!" 

Although  her  back  was  toward  me  I  felt  her  glare. 
The  wretches  winced.  She  came  a  dozen  steps  to 
ward  me,  then  turned  swiftly  to  glare  again.  They 
shuddered,  even  though  she  spoke  no  word.  Then 
she  came  on,  muttering  hotly,  and  together  we  ap 
proached  the  ranch  house.  A  dozen  feet  from  the 
door  she  bounded  ahead  of  me  with  a  cry  of  baffled 
rage.  I  saw  why.  Lew  Wee,  unrecking  her  ap 
proach,  was  cold-bloodedly  committing  an  encore. 
She  sped  through  the  doorway,  and  I  heard  Lew  Wee's 
frightened  squeal  as  he  sped  through  another.  When 
I  stood  in  the  room  she  was  putting  violent  hands  to 
the  throat  of  the  thing. 

"The  hours  I  spend  with  th "  The  throttled 

note  expired  in  a  very  dreadful  squawk  of  agony.  It 
was  as  if  foul  murder  had  been  done,  and  done  swiftly. 
The  maddened  woman  faced  me  with  the  potentially 
evil  disk  clutched  in  her  hands.  In  a  voice  that  is 
a  notable  loss  to  our  revivals  of  Greek  tragedy  she 
declaimed: 

"Ain't  it  the  limit? — and  the  last  thing  I  done  was 
to  hide  out  that  record  up  behind  the  clock  where  he 
couldn't  find  it!" 

In  a  sudden  new  alarm  and  with  three  long  steps 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  49 

she  reached  the  door  of  the  kitchen  and  flung  it  open. 
Through  a  window  thus  exposed  we  beheld  the 
offender.  One  so  seldom  thinks  of  the  Chinese  as 
athletes!  Lew  Wee  was  well  down  the  flat  toward 
the  cottonwoods  and  still  going  strong. 

"Ain't  it  the  limit?  "  again  demanded  his  employer. 
"Gosh  all — excuse  me,  but  they  got  me  into  such  a 
state.  Here  I  am  panting  like  a  tjuckered  hound. 
And  now  I  got  to  make  the  tea  myself.  He  won't 
dare  come  back  before  suppertime." 

It  seemed  to  be  not  yet  an  occasion  for  words  from 
me.  I  tried  for  a  look  of  intelligent  sympathy.  In 
the  kitchen  I  heard  her  noisily  fill  a  teakettle  with 
water.  She  was  not  herself  yet.  She  still  muttered 
hotly.  I  moved  to  the  magazine-littered  table  and 
affected  to  be  taken  with  the  portrait  of  a  smug-look 
ing  prize  Holstein  on  the  first  page  of  the  Stock 
Breeder's  Gazette. 

The  volcano  presently  seethed  through  the  room 
and  entered  its  own  apartment. 

Ten  minutes  later  my  hostess  emerged  with  re 
covered  aplomb.  She  had  donned  a  skirt  and  a 
flowered  blouse,  and  dusted  powder  upon  and  about 
her  sunburned  and  rather  blobby  nose.  Her  crinkly 
gray  hair  had  been  drawn  to  a  knot  at  the  back 
of  her  grenadier's  head.  Her  widely  set  eyes 
gleamed  with  the  smile  of  her  broad  and  competent 
mouth. 

"Tea  in  one  minute,"  she  promised  more  than 
audibly  as  she  bustled  into  the  kitchen.  It  really 


50  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

came  in  five,  and  beside  the  tray  she  pleasantly  re 
laxed.  The  cups  were  filled  and  a  breach  was  made 
upon  the  cake  she  had  brought.  The  tea  was  ad 
vertising  a  sufficient  strength,  yet  she  now  raised  the 
dynamics  of  her  own  portion. 

"I'll  just  spill  a  hooker  of  this  here  Scotch  into 
mine,"  she  said,  and  then,  as  she  did  even  so:  "My 
lands!  Ain't  I  the  cynical  old  Kate!  And  silly! 
Letting  them  boys  upset  me  that  way  with  that  there 
fool  song."  She  decanted  a  saucerful  of  the  re- 
enforced  tea  and  raised  it  to  her  pursed  lips.  "Look 
ing  at  you!"  she  murmured  cavernously  and  drank 
deep.  She  put  the  saucer  back  where  nice  persons 
leave  theirs  at  all  times.  "Say,  it  was  hot  over  on 
that  bench  to-day.  I  was  getting  out  that  bunch  of 
bull  calves,  and  all  the  time  here  was  old  Safety  First 
mumbling  round " 

This  was  rather  promising,  but  I  had  resolved 
differently. 

"That  song,"  I  insinuated.  "Of  course  there  are 
people " 

"You  bet  there  are!  I'm  one  of  'em,  too!  What 
that  song's  done  to  me — and  to  other  innocent  by 
standers  in  the  last  couple  weeks " 

She  sighed  hugely,  drank  more  of  the  fortified  brew 
— nicely  from  the  cup  this  time — and  fashioned  a 
cigarette  from  materials  at  her  hand. 

In  the  flame  of  a  lighted  match  Mrs.  Pettengill's 
eyes  sparkled  with  a  kind  of  savage  retrospection. 
She  shrugged  it  off  impatiently. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  51 

"I  guess  you  thought  I  spoke  a  mite  short  when 
you  asked  about  Nettie's  wedding  yesterday." 

It  was  true.  She  had  turned  the  friendly  inquiry 
with  a  rather  mystifying  abruptness.  I  murmured 
politely.  She  blew  twin  jets  of  smoke  from  the 
widely  separated  corners  of  her  generous  mouth  and 
then  shrewdly  narrowed  her  gaze  to  some  distant 
point  of  narration. 

"Yes,  sir,  I  says  to  her,  *  Woman's  place  is  the 
home.'  And  what  you  think  she  come  back  with? 
That  she  was  going  to  be  a  leader  of  the  New  Dawn. 
Yes,  sir,  just  like  that.  Five  feet  one,  a  hundred  and 
eight  pounds  in  her  winter  clothes,  a  confirmed  pickle 
eater — pretty  enough,  even  if  she  is  kind  of  peaked 
and  spiritual  looking — and  going  to  lead  the  New 
Dawn. 

"Where'd  she  catch  it?  My  fault,  of  course, 
sending  her  back  East  to  school  and  letting  her  visit 
the  W.  B.  Hemingways,  Mrs.  H.  being  the  well- 
known  clubwoman  like  the  newspapers  always  print 
under  her  photo  in  evening  dress.  That's  how  she 
caught  it  all  right. 

"I  hadn't  realized  it  when  she  first  got  back,  except 
she  was  pale  and  faraway  in  the  eyes  and  et  pickles 
heavily  at  every  meal — oh,  mustard,  dill,  sour,  sweet, 
anything  that  was  pickles — and  not  enough  meat  and 
regular  victuals.  Gaunted  she  was,  but  I  didn't 
suspect  her  mind  was  contaminated  none  till  I  sprung 
Chester  Timmins  on  her  as  a  good  marrying  bet.  You 
know  Chet,  son  of  old  Dave  that  has  the  Lazy  Eight 


52  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Ranch  over  on  Pipe  Stone — a  good,  clean  boy  that'll 
have  the  ranch  to  himself  as  soon  as  old  Dave  dies  of 
meanness,  and  that  can't  be  long  now.  It  was  then 
she  come  out  delirious  about  not  being  the  pampered 
toy  of  any  male — male,  mind  you!  It  seems  when 
these  hussies  want  to  knock  man  nowadays  they  call 
him  a  male.  And  she  rippled  on  about  the  freedom 
of  her  soul  and  her  downtrod  sisters  and  this  here 
New  Dawn. 

"Well,  sir,  a  baby  could  have  pushed  me  flat  with 
one  finger.  At  first  I  didn'  know  no  better'n  to  argue 
with  her,  I  was  that  affrighted.  'Why,  Nettie  Hos- 
ford,'  I  says,  'to  think  I've  lived  to  hear  my  only  sis 
ter's  only  child  talking  in  shrieks  like  that !  To  think 
I  should  have  to  tell  one  of  my  own  kin  that  women's 
place  is  the  home.  Look  at  me,'  I  says — we  was 
down  in  Red  Gap  at  the  time — 'pretty  soon  I'll  go  up 
to  the  ranch  and  what'll  I  do  there?"  I  says. 

"'Well,  listen,'  I  says,  'to  a  few  of  the  things  I'll 
be  doing:  I'll  be  marking,  branding,  and  vaccinating 
the  calves,  I'll  be  classing  and  turning  out  the  strong 
cattle  on  the  range.  I'll  be  having  the  colts  rid, 
breaking  mules  for  haying,  oiling  and  mending  the 
team  harness,  cutting  and  hauling  posts,  tattooing 
the  ears  and  registering  the  thoroughbred  calves, 
putting  in  dams,  cleaning  ditches,  irrigating  the  flats, 
setting  out  the  vegetable  garden,  building  fence, 
swinging  new  gates,  overhauling  the  haying  tools,  re 
ceiving,  marking,  and  branding  the  new  two-year-old 
bulls,  plowing  and  seeding  grain  for  our  work  stock 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  53 

and  hogs,  breaking  in  new  cooks  and  blacksmiths ' — I 
was  so  mad  I  went  on  till  I  was  winded.  'And  that 
ain't  half  of  it,'  I  says.  'Women's  work  is  never 
done;  her  place  is  in  the  home  and  she  finds  so  much 
to  do  right  there  that  she  ain't  getting  any  time  to 
lead  a  New  Dawn.  I'll  start  you  easy,'  I  says;  'learn 
you  to  bake  a  batch  of  bread  or  do  a  tub  of  washing — 
something  simple — and  there's  Chet  Timmins,  wait 
ing  to  give  you  a  glorious  future  as  wife  and  mother 
and  helpmeet.' 

"She  just  give  me  one  look  as  cold  as  all  arctics  and 
says,  'It's  repellent' — that's  all,  just  'repellent/  I 
see  I  was  up  against  it.  No  good  talking.  Some 
times  it  comes  over  me  like  a  flash  when  not  to  talk. 
It  does  to  some  women.  So  I  affected  a  light  manner 
and  pretended  to  laugh  it  off,  just  as  if  I  didn't  see 
scandal  threatening — think  of  having  it  talked  about 
that  a  niece  of  my  own  raising  was  a  leader  of  the  New 
Dawn! 

"'All  right,'  I  says,  'only,  of  course,  Chet  Tim 
mins  is  a  good  friend  and  neighbour  of  mine,  even  if 
he  is  a  male,  so  I  hope  you  won't  mind  his  dropping  in 
now  and  again  from  time  to  time,  just  to  say  howdy 
and  eat  a  meal.'  And  she  flusters  me  again  with  her 
coolness. 

"'No/  she  says,  'I  won't  mind,  but  I  know  what 
you're  counting  on,  and  it  won't  do  either  of  you  any 
good.  I'm  above  the  appeal  of  a  man's  mere  pres 
ence/  she  says,  'for  I've  thrown  off  the  age-long  sub 
jection;  but  I  won't  mind  his  coming.  I  shall  delight 


54  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

to  study  him.  They're  all  alike,  and  one  specimen  is 
as  good  as  another  for  that.  But  neither  of  you  need 
expect  anything,'  she  says,  'for  the  wrongs  of  my 
sisters  have  armoured  me  against  the  grossness  of 
mere  sex  appeal.'  Excuse  me  for  getting  off  such 
things,  but  I'm  telling  you  how  she  talked. 

"*Oh,  shucks!'  I  says  to  myself  profanely,  for  all  at 
once  I  saw  she  wasn't  talking  her  own  real  thoughts 
but  stuff  she'd  picked  up  from  the  well-known  lady 
friends  of  Mrs.  W.  B.  Hemingway.  I  was  mad  all 
right;  but  the  minute  I  get  plumb  sure  mad  I  get  wily. 
'I  was  just  trying  you  out,'  I  says.  'Of  course  you 
are  right!'  'Of  course  I  am,'  says  she,  'though  I 
hardly  expected  you  to  see  it,  you  being  so  hardened 
a  product  of  the  ancient  ideal  of  slave  marriage.' 

"At  them  words  it  was  pretty  hard  for  me  to  keep 
on  being  wily,  but  I  kept  all  right.  I  kept  beautifully. 
I  just  laughed  and  said  we'd  have  Chet  Timmins  up 
for  supper,  and  she  laughed  and  said  it  would  be 
amusing. 

"And  it  was,  or  it  would  have  been  if  it  hadn't  been 
so  sad  and  disgusting.  Chet,  you  see,  had  plumb 
crumpled  the  first  time  he  ever  set  eyes  on  her,  and 
he's  never  been  able  to  uncrumple.  He  always 
choked  up  the  minute  she'd  come  into  the  room,  and 
that  night  he  choked  worse'n  ever  because  the  little 
devil  started  in  to  lead  him  on — aiming  to  show  me 
how  she  could  study  a  male,  I  reckon.  He  couldn't 
even  ask  for  some  more  of  the  creamed  potatoes  with 
out  choking  up — with  her  all  the  time  using  her  eyes 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  55 

on  him,  and  telling  him  how  a  great  rough  man  like 
him  scared  'poor  little  me.'  Chet's  tan  bleaches  out 
a  mite  by  the  end  of  winter,  but  she  kept  his  face 
exactly  the  shade  of  that  new  mahogany  sideboard  I 
got,  and  she  told  him  several  times  that  he  ought  to 
go  see  a  throat  specialist  right  off  about  that  choking 
of  his. 

"And  after  supper  I'm  darned  if  she  didn't  lure 
him  out  onto  the  porch  in  the  moonlight,  and  stand 
there  sad  looking  and  helpless,  simply  egging  him  on, 
mind  you,  her  in  one  of  them  little  squashy  white 
dresses  that  she  managed  to  brush  against  him — all 
in  the  way  of  cold  study,  mind  you.  Say,  ain't  we 
the  lovely  tame  rattlesnakes  when  we  want  to  be! 
And  this  big  husky  lummox  of  a  Chester  Timmins — 
him  she'd  called  a  male — what  does  he  do  but  stand 
safely  at  a  distance  of  four  feet  in  the  grand  romantic 
light  of  the  full  moon,  and  tell  her  vivaciously  all 
about  the  new  saddle  he's  having  made  in  Spokane. 
And  even  then  he  not  only  chokes  but  he  giggles. 
They  do  say  a  strong  man  in  tears  is  a  terrible  sight. 
But  a  husky  man  giggling  is  worse — take  it  from  one 
who  has  suffered.  And  all  the  time  I  knew  his  heart 
was  furnishing  enough  actual  power  to  run  a  feed 
chopper.  So  did  she! 

"'The  creature  is  so  typical,'  she  says  when  the 
poor  cuss  had  finally  stumbled  down  the  front  steps. 
4  He's  a  real  type.'  Only  she  called  it  'teep,'  having 
studied  the  French  language  among  other  things. 
*  He  is  a  teep  indeed ! '  she  says. 


56  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"I  had  to  admit  myself  that  Chester  wasn't  any 
self-starter.  I  saw  he'd  have  to  be  cranked  by  an 
outsider  if  he  was  going  to  win  a  place  of  his  own  in 
the  New  Dawn.  And  I  kept  thinking  wily,  and  the 
next  P.  M.  when  Nettie  and  I  was  downtown  I  got 
my  hunch.  You  know  that  music  store  on  Fourth 
Street  across  from  the  Boston  Cash  Emporium. 
It's  kept  by  C.  Wilbur  Todd,  and  out  in  front  in  a 
glass  case  he  had  a  mechanical  banjo  that  was  play 
ing  'The  Rosary'  with  variations  when  we  come  by. 
We  stopped  a  minute  to  watch  the  machinery  picking 
the  strings  and  in  a  flash  I  says  to  myself,  *I  got  it! 
Eureka,  California!'  I  says,  'it's  come  to  me!' 

"Of  course  that  piece  don't  sound  so  awful  tender 
when  it's  done  on  a  banjo  with  variations,  but  I'd 
heard  it  done  right  and  swell  one  time  and  so  I  says, 
*  There's  the  song  of  songs  to  bring  foolish  males  and 
females  to  their  just  mating  sense.' '' 

The  speaker  paused  to  drain  her  cup  and  to  fashion 
another  cigarette,  her  eyes  dreaming  upon  far  vistas. 

"Ain't  it  fierce  what  music  does  to  persons,"  she 
resumed.  "Right  off  I  remembered  the  first  time 
I'd  heard  that  piece — in  New  York  City  four  years 
ago,  in  a  restaurant  after  the  theatre  one  night, 
where  I'd  gone  with  Mrs.  W.  B.  Hemingway  and  her 
husband.  A  grand,  gay  place  it  was,  with  an  or 
chestra.  I  picked  at  some  untimely  food  and  sipped 
a  highball — they  wouldn't  let  a  lady  smoke  there — 
and  what  interested  me  was  the  folks  that  come  in. 
Folks  always  do  interest  me  something  amazing. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  57 

Strange  ones  like  that,  I  mean,  where  you  set  and 
try  to  figure  out  all  about  'em,  what  kind  of  homes 
they  got,  and  how  they  act  when  they  ain't  in  a  swell 
restaurant,  and  everything.  Pretty  soon  comes  a 
couple  to  the  table  next  us  and,  say,  they  was  just 
plain  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Mad.  Both  of  'em  stall-fed. 
He  was  a  large,  shiny  lad,  with  pink  jowls  barbered 
to  death  and  wicked  looking,  like  a  well-known 
clubman  or  villain.  The  lady  was  spectacular  and 
cynical,  with  a  cold,  thin  nose  and  eyes  like  a  couple 
of  glass  marbles.  Her  hair  was  several  shades  off  a 
legal  yellow  and  she  was  dressed!  She  would  have 
made  handsome  loot,  believe  me — aigrette,  bracelets, 

rings,   dog  collar,  gold-mesh  bag,  vanity  case 

Oh,  you  could  see  at  a  glance  that  she  was  one  of 
them  Broadway  social  favourites  you  read  about. 
And  both  grouchy,  like  I  said.  He  scowled  till  you 
knew  he'd  just  love  to  beat  a  crippled  step-child  to 
death,  and  she — well,  her  work  wasn't  so  coarse;  she 
kept  her  mad  down  better.  She  set  there  as  nice  and 
sweet  as  a  pet  scorpion. 

"A  scrap,'  I  says  to  myself,  'and  they've  only 
half  finished.  She's  threatened  to  quit  and  he,  the 
cowardly  dog,  has  dared  her  to.'  Plain  enough. 
The  waiter  knew  it  soon  as  I  did  when  he  come  to 
take  their  order.  Wouldn't  speak  to  each  other. 
Talked  through  him;  fought  it  out  to  something 
different  for  each  one.  Couldn't  even  agnee  on  the 
same  kind  of  cocktail.  Both  slamming  the  waiter — 
before  they  fought  the  order  to  a  finish  each  had 


58  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

wanted  to  call  the  head  waiter,  only  the  other  one 
stopped  it. 

"So  I  rubbered  awhile,  trying  to  figure  out  why 
such  folks  want  to  finish  up  their  fights  in  a  restaurant, 
and  then  I  forgot  'em,  looking  at  some  other  per 
sons  that  come  in.  Then  the  orchestra  started  this 
song  and  I  seen  a  lady  was  getting  up  in  front  to 
sing  it.  I  admit  the  piece  got  me.  It  got  me  good. 
Really,  ain't  it  the  gooey  mess  of  heart-throbs 
when  you  come  right  down  to  it?  This  lady  singer 
was  a  good-looking  sad-faced  contralto  in  a  low- 
cut  black  dress — and  how  she  did  get  the  tears  out 
of  them  low  notes!  Oh,  I  quit  looking  at  people 
while  her  chest  was  oozing  out  that  music.  And  it 
got  others,  too.  I  noticed  lots  of  'em  had  stopped 
eating  when  I  looked  round,  and  there  was  so  much 
clapping  she  had  to  get  up  and  do  it  all  over  again. 
And  what  you  think?  In  the  middle  of  the  second 
time  I  look  over  to  these  fighters,  and  darned  if  they 
ain't  holding  hands  across  the  table;  and  more,  she's 
she's  got  a  kind  of  pitiful,  crying  smile  on  and  he's 
crying  right  out — crying  into  his  cold  asparagus, 
plain  as  day. 

"What  more  would  you  want  to  know  about  the 
powers  of  this  here  piece  of  music?  They  both  spoke 
like  human  beings  to  the  scared  waiter  when  he  come 
back,  and  the  lad  left  a  five-spot  on  the  tray  when 
he  paid  his  check.  Some  song,  yes? 

"And  all  this  flashed  back  on  me  when  Nettie  and 
I  stood  there  watching  this  cute  little  banjo.  So  I 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  59 

says  to  myself,  Tlere,  my  morbid  vestal,  is  where  I 
put  you  sane;  here's  where  I  hurl  an  asphyxiating 
bomb  into  the  trenches  of  the  New  Dawn.'  Out 
loud  I  only  says,  'Let's  go  in  and  see  if  Wilbur  has 
got  some  new  records.' 

"  'Wilbur?'  says  she,  and  we  went  in.  Nettie  had 
not  met  Wilbur. 

"I  may  as  well  tell  you  here  and  now  that  C. 
Wilbur  Todd  is  a  shrimp.  Shrimp  I  have  said  and 
shrimp  I  always  will  say.  He  talks  real  brightly  in 
his  way — he  will  speak  words  like  an  actor  or  some 
thing — but  for  brains!  Say,  he  always  reminds  me 
of  the  dub  friend  of  the  great  detective  in  the  maga 
zine  stories,  the  one  that  goes  along  to  the  scene  of 
the  crime  to  ask  silly  questions  and  make  fool  guesses 
about  the  guilty  one,  and  never  even  suspects  who 
done  the  murder,  till  the  detective  tells  on  the  last 
page  when  they're  all  together  in  the  library. 

"Sure,  that's  Wilbur.  It  would  be  an  ideal  posi 
tion  for  him.  Instead  of  which  he  runs  this  here 
music  store,  sells  these  jitney  pianos  and  phono 
graphs  and  truck  like  that.  And  serious!  Honestly, 
if  you  seen  him  coming  down  the  street  you'd  say, 
'There  comes  one  of  these  here  musicians.'  Wears 
long  hair  and  a  low  collar  and  a  flowing  necktie  and 
talks  about  his  technique.  Yes,  sir,  about  the  tech 
nique  of  working  a  machinery  piano.  Gives  free 
recitals  in  the  store  every  second  Saturday  afternoon, 
and  to  see  him  set  down  and  pump  with  his  feet,  and 
push  levers  and  pull  handles,  weaving  himself  back  and 


60  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

forth,  tossing  his  long,  silken  locks  back  and  looking 
dreamily  off  into  the  distance,  you'd  think  he  was  a 
Paderewski.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  I've  seen  Paderew- 
ski  play  and  he  don't  make  a  tenth  of  the  fuss  Wilbur 
does.  And  after  this  recital  I  was  at  one  Saturday 
he  comes  up  to  some  of  us  ladies,  mopping  his  pale 
brow,  and  he  says,  '  It  does  take  it  out  of  one !  I'm 
always  a  nervous  wreck  after  these  little  affairs  of 
mine.'  Would  that  get  you,  or  would  it  not? 

"  So  we  go  in  the  store  and  Wilbur  looks  up  from  a 
table  he's  setting  at  in  the  back  end. 

"'You  find  me  studying  some  new  manuscripts,' 
he  says,  pushing  back  the  raven  locks  from  his  brow. 
Say,  it  was  a  weary  gesture  he  done  it  with — sort  of 
languid  and  world-weary.  And  what  you  reckon 
he  meant  by  studying  manuscripts?  Why,  he  had 
one  of  these  rolls  of  paper  with  the  music  punched 
into  it  in  holes,  and  he  was  studying  that  line  that 
tells  you  when  to  play  hard  or  soft  and  all  like  that. 
Honest,  that  was  it! 

"  *I  always  study  these  manuscripts  of  the  masters 
conscientiously  before  I  play  them,'  says  he. 

"Such  is  Wilbur.  Such  he  will  ever  be.  So  I 
introduced  him  to  Nettie  and  asked  if  he  had  this 
here  song  on  a  phonograph  record.  He  had.  He 
had  it  on  two  records.  'One  by  a  barytone  gentle 
man,  and  one  by  a  mezzo-soprano,'  says  Wilbur. 
I  set  myself  back  for  both.  He  also  had  it  with 
variations  on  one  of  these  punched  rolls.  He  played 
that  for  us.  It  took  him  three  minutes  to  get  set 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  61 

right  at  the  piano  and  to  dust  his  fingers  with  a  white 
silk  handkerchief  which  he  wore  up  his  sleeve.  And 
he  played  with  great  expression  and  agony  and  bend 
ing  exercises,  ever  and  anon  tossing  back  his  rebelli 
ous  locks  and  fixing  us  with  a  look  of  pained  ecstasy. 
Of  course  it  sounded  better  than  the  banjo,  but  you 
got  to  have  the  voice  with  that  song  if  you're  meaning 
to  do  any  crooked  work.  Nettie  was  much  taken 
with  it  even  so,  and  Wilbur  played  it  another  way. 
What  he  said  was  that  it  was  another  school  of  inter 
pretation.  It  seemed  to  have  its  points  with  him, 
though  he  favoured  the  first  school,  he  said,  because 
of  a  certain  almost  rugged  fidelity.  He  said  the 
other  school  was  marked  by  a  tendency  to  idealism, 
and  he  pulled  some  of  the  handles  to  show  how  it 
was  done.  I'm  merely  telling  you  how  Wilbur 
talked. 

"Nettie  listened  very  serious.  There  was  a  new 
look  in  her  eyes.  '  That  song  has  got  to  her  even  on 
a  machinery  piano,'  I  says,  'but  wait  till  we  get  the 
voice,  with  she  and  Chester  out  in  the  mischievous 
moonlight.'  Wasn't  I  the  wily  old  hound!  Nettie 
sort  of  lingered  to  hear  Wilbur,  who  was  going  good 
by  this  time.  'One  must  be  the  soul  behind  the 
wood  and  wire,'  he  says;  'one  rather  feels  just  that, 
or  one  remains  merely  a  brutal  mechanic.' 

"'I  understand,'  says  Nettie.  'How  you  must 
have  studied!' 

"'Oh,  studied!'  says  Wilbur,  and  tossed  his  mane 
back  and  laughed  in  a  lofty  and  suffering  manner. 


62  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Studied !  He'd  gone  one  year  to  a  business  college  in 
Seattle  after  he  got  out  of  high  school! 

"'I  understand,'  says  Nettie,  looking  all  reverent 
and  buffaloed. 

"  'It  is  the  price  one  must  pay  for  technique,'  says 
Wilbur.  'And  to-day  you  found  me  in  the  mood. 
I  am  not  always  in  the  mood.' 

"  'I  understand,'  says  Nettie. 

"I'm  just  giving  you  an  idea,  understand.  Then 
Wilbur  says,  'I  will  bring  these  records  up  this 
evening  if  I  may.  The  mezzo-soprano  requires  a 
radically  different  adjustment  from  the  barytone.' 
'My  God!'  thinks  I,  'has  he  got  technique  on  the 
phonograph,  too!'  But  I  says  he  must  come  by  all 
means,  thinking  he  could  tend  the  machine  while 
Nettie  and  Chester  is  out  on  the  porch  getting  wise  to 
each  other. 

"'There's  another  teep  for  you,'  I  says  to  Nettie 
when  we  got  out  of  the  place.  'He  certainly  is 
marked  by  tendencies,'  I  says.  I  meant  it  for  a 
nasty  slam  at  Wilbur's  painful  deficiencies  as  a  human 
being,  but  she  took  it  as  serious  as  Wilbur  took 
himself — which  is  some! 

"'Ah,  yes,  the  artist  teep,'  says  she,  'the  most 
complex,  the  most  baffling  of  all.' 

"That  was  a  kind  of  a  sickish  jolt  to  me — the 
idea  that  something  as  low  in  the  animal  kingdom 
as  Wilbur  could  baffle  any  one — but  I  thinks, '  Shucks ! 
Wait  till  he  lines  up  alongside  of  a  regular  human 
man  like  Chet  Timmins!' 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  63 

"I  had  Chet  up  to  supper  again.  He  still  choked 
on  words  of  one  syllable  if  Nettie  so  much  as  glanced 
at  him,  and  turned  all  sorts  of  painful  colours  like 
a  cheap  rug.  But  I  keep  thinking  the  piece  will  fix 
that  all  right. 

"At  eight  o'clock  Wilbur  sifted  in  with  his  records 
and  something  else  flat  and  thin,  done  up  in  paper 
that  I  didn't  notice  much  at  the  time.  My  dear 
heart,  how  serious  he  was!  As  serious  as — well,  I 
chanced  to  be  present  at  the  house  of  mourning  when 
the  barber  come  to  shave  old  Judge  Armstead  after 
he'd  passed  away — you  know  what  I  mean — kind  of 
like  him  Wilbur  was,  talking  subdued  and  cat-footing 
round  very  solemn  and  professional.  I  thought  he'd 
never  get  that  machine  going.  He  cleaned  it,  and 
he  oiled  it,  and  he  had  great  trouble  picking  out  the 
right  fibre  needle,  holding  six  or  eight  of  'em  up  to 
the  light,  doing  secret  things  to  the  machine's  inwards, 
looking  at  us  sharp  as  if  we  oughtn't  to  be  talking 
even  then,  and  when  she  did  move  off  I'm  darned  if  he 
didn't  hang  in  a  strained  manner  over  that  box,  like 
he  was  the  one  that  was  doing  it  all  and  it  wouldn't 
get  the  notes  right  if  he  took  his  attention  off. 

"It  was  a  first-class  record,  I'll  say  that.  It  was 
the  male  barytone — one  of  them  pleading  voices 
that  get  all  into  you.  It  wasn't  half  over  before  I 
seen  Nettie  was  strongly  moved,  as  they  say,  only 
she  was  staring  at  Wilbur,  who  by  now  was  leading 
the  orchestra  with  one  graceful  arm  and  looking 
absorbed  and  sodden,  like  he  done  it  unconsciously. 


64  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Chester  just  set  there  with  his  mouth  open,  like 
something  you  see  at  one  of  these  here  aquariums. 

"We  moved  round  some  when  it  was  over,  while 
Wilbur  was  picking  out  just  the  right  needle  for  the 
other  record,  and  so  I  managed  to  cut  that  lump  of  a 
Chester  out  of  the  bunch  and  hold  him  on  the  porch 
till  I  got  Nettie  out,  too.  Then  I  said  'Sh-h-h!'  so 
they  wouldn't  move  when  Wilbur  let  the  mezzo- 
soprano  start.  And  they  had  to  stay  out  there  in  the 
golden  moonlight  with  love's  young  dream  and  every 
thing.  The  lady  singer  was  good,  too.  No  use  in 
talking,  that  song  must  have  done  a  lot  of  heart 
work  right  among  our  very  best  families.  It  had 
me  going  again  so  I  plumb  forgot  my  couple  outside. 
I  even  forgot  Wilbur,  standing  by  the  box  showing 
the  lady  how  to  sing. 

"It  come  to  the  last — you  know  how  it  ends — 
'To  kiss  the  cross,  sweetheart,  to  kiss  the  cross!' 
There  was  a  rich  and  silent  moment  and  I  says,  'If 
that  Chet  Timmins  hasn't  shown  himself  to  be  a 

regular  male  teep  by  this  time '  And  here  come 

Chet's  voice,  choking  as  usual,  'Yes,  paw  switched 
to  Durhams  and  Herefords  over  ten  years  ago — you 
see  Holsteins  was  too  light;  they  don't  carry  the 

meat '  Honest!  I'm  telling  you  what  I  heard. 

And  yet  when  they  come  in  I  could  see  that  Chester 
had  had  tears  in  his  eyes  from  that  song,  so  still  I 
didn't  give  in,  especially  as  Nettie  herself  looked 
very  exalted,  like  she  wasn't  at  that  minute  giving 
two  whoops  in  the  bad  place  for  the  New  Dawn. 


a53 
I! 

W   a 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  65 

"Nettie  made  for  Wilbur,  who  was  pushing  back 
his  hair  with  a  weak  but  graceful  sweep  of  the  arm — 
it  had  got  down  before  his  face  like  a  portiere — and 
I  took  Chet  into  a  corner  and  tried  to  get  some  of  the 
just  wrath  of  God  into  his  heart;  but,  my  lands! 
You'd  have  said  he  didn't  know  there  was  such  a 
thing  as  a  girl  in  the  whole  Kulanche  Valley.  He 
didn't  seem  to  hear  me.  He  talked  other  matters. 

"  Taw  thinks,'  he  says,  '  that  he  might  manage 
to  take  them  hundred  and  fifty  bull  calves  off  your 
hands.'  'Oh,  indeed!'  I  says.  'And  does  he  think 
of  buying  'em — as  is  often  done  in  the  cattle  business 
— or  is  he  merely  aiming  to  do  me  a  favour?'  I  was 
that  mad  at  the  poor  worm,  but  he  never  knew. 
'Why,  now,  paw  says  "You  tell  Maw  Pettengill  I 
might  be  willing  to  take  'em  off  her  hands  at  fifty 
dollars  a  head,"'  he  says.  'I  should  think  he  might 
be,'  I  says,  'but  they  ain't  bothering  my  hands  the 
least  little  mite.  I  like  to  have  'em  on  my  hands 
at  anything  less  than  sixty  a  head,'  I  says.  'Your 
pa,'  I  went  on,  'is  the  man  that  started  this  here 
safety-first  cry.  Others  may  claim  the  honour,  but 
it  belongs  solely  to  him.'  'He  never  said  anything 
about  that,'  says  poor  Chester.  'He  just  said  you 
was  going  to  be  short  of  range  this  summer/  'Be 
that  all  too  true,  as  it  may  be,'  I  says,  'but  I  still 

got  my  business  faculties '  And  I  was  going  on 

some  more,  but  just  then  I  seen  Nettie  and  Wilbur 
was  awful  thick  over  something  he'd  unwrapped 
from  the  other  package  he'd  brought.  It  was  neither 


66  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

more  nor  less  than  a  big  photo  of  C.  Wilbur  Todd. 
Yes,  sir,  he'd  brought  her  one. 

"'I  think  the  artist  has  caught  a  bit  of  the  real 
just  there,  if  you  know  what  I  mean,'  says  Wilbur, 
laying  a  pale  thumb  across  the  upper  part  of  the 
horrible  thing. 

"'I  understand,'  says  Nettie,  'the  real  you  was 
expressing  itself.' 

"'Perhaps,'  concedes  Wilbur  kind  of  nobly.  'I 
dare  say  he  caught  me  in  one  of  my  rarer  moods. 
You  don't  think  it  too  idealized?' 

"'Don't  jest/  says  she,  very  pretty  and  severe. 
And  they  both  gazed  spellbound. 

"'Chester,'  I  says  in  low  but  venomous  tones, 
'you  been  hanging  round  that  girl  worse  than  Grant 
hung  round  Richmond,  but  you  got  to  remember  that 
Grant  was  more  than  a  hanger.  He  made  moves, 
Chester,  moves!  Do  you  get  me?' 

"'About  them  calves,'  says  Chester,  'pa  told  me 
it's  his  honest  opinion ' 

"Well,  that  was  enough  for  once.  I  busted  up 
that  party  sudden  and  firm. 

"  'It  has  meant  much  to  me,'  says  Wilbur  at  part 
ing. 

f"I  understand,'  says  Nettie. 

"'When  you  come  up  to  the  ranch,  Miss  Nettie,' 
says  Chester,  'you  want  to  ride  over  to  the  Lazy 
Eight,  and  see  that  there  tame  coyote  I  got.  It  licks 
your  hand  like  a  dog.' 

"But  what  could  I  do,  more  than  what  I  had  done? 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  67 

Nettie  was  looking  at  the  photograph  when  I  shut 
the  door  on  'em.  'The  soul  behind  the  wood  and 
wire,'  she  murmurs.  I  looked  closer  then  and  what 
do  you  reckon  it  was?  Just  as  true  as  I  set  here,  it 
was  Wilbur,  leaning  forward  all  negligent  and  patron 
izing  on  a  twelve-hundred-dollar  grand  piano,  his 
hair  well  forward  and  his  eyes  masterful,  like  that 
there  noble  instrument  was  his  bond  slave.  But 
wait!  And  underneath  he'd  writ  a  bar  of  music 
with  notes  running  up  and  down,  and  signed  his 
name  to  it — not  plain,  mind  you,  though  he  can 
write  a  good  business  hand  if  he  wants  to,  but  all 
scrawly  like  some  one  important,  so  you  couldn't 
tell  if  it  was  meant  for  Dutch  or  English.  Could 
you  beat  that  for  nerve — in  a  day,  in  a  million  years? 

"'What's  Wilbur  writing  that  kind  of  music  for?' 
I  asks  in  a  cold  voice.  'He  don't  know  that  kind. 
What  he  had  ought  to  of  written  is  a  bunch  of  them 
hollow  slats  and  squares  like  they  punch  in  the  only 
kind  of  music  he  plays,'  I  says. 

"'Hush!'  says  Nettie.  'It's  that  last  divine 
phrase,  "To  kiss  the  cross!'" 

"I  choked  up  myself  then.  And  I  went  to  bed 
and  thought.  And  this  is  what  I  thought:  When  you 
think  you  got  the  winning  hand,  keep  on  raising. 
To  call  is  to  admit  you  got  no  faith  in  your  judgment. 
Better  lay  down  than  call.  So  I  resolve  not  to  say 
another  word  to  the  girl  about  Chester,  but  simply 
to  press  the  song  in  on  her.  Already  it  had  made  her 
act  like  a  human  person.  Of  course  I  didn't  worry 


68  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

none  about  Wilbur.  The  wisdom  of  the  ages  couldn't 
have  done  that.  But  I  seen  I  had  got  to  have  a  real 
first-class  human  voice  in  that  song,  like  the  one  I 
had  heard  in  New  York  City.  They'll  just  have  to 
clench,  I  think,  when  they  hear  a  good  A-number-one 
voice  in  it. 

"Next  day  I  look  in  on  Wilbur  and  say,  'What 
about  this  concert  and  musical  entertainment  the 
North  Side  set  is  talking  about  giving  for  the  starving 
Belgians?' 

"The  plans  are  maturing,'  he  says,  'but  I'm 
getting  up  a  Brahms  concerto  that  I  have  promised 
to  play — you  know  how  terrifically  difficult  Brahms 
is — so  the  date  hasn't  been  set  yet.' 

"'Well,  set  it  and  let's  get  to  work,'  I  says.  'There'll 
be  you,  and  the  North  Side  Ladies'  String  Quartet, 
and  Ed  Bughalter  with  a  bass  solo,  and  Mrs.  Dr. 
Percy  Hailey  Martingale  with  the  "Jewel  Song"  from 
Faust,  and  I  been  thinking,'  I  says,  'that  we  had 
ought  to  get  a  good  professional  lady  concert  singer 
down  from  Spokane.' 

'"I'm  afraid  the  expenses  would  go  over  our  re 
ceipts,'  says  Wilbur,  and  I  can  see  him  figuring  that 
this  concert  will  cost  the  Belgians  money  instead  of 
helping  'em;  so  right  off  I  says,  'If  you  can  get  a 
good-looking,  sad-faced  contralto,  with  a  low-cut 
black  dress,  that  can  sing  "The  Rosary"  like  it  had 
ought  to  be  sung,  why,  you  can  touch  me  for  that 
part  of  the  evening's  entertainment.' 

"Wilbur  says  I'm  too  good,  not  suspicioning  I'm 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  69 

just  being  wily,  so  he  says  he'll  write  up  and  fix  it. 
And  a  couple  days  later  he  says  the  lady  professional  is 
engaged,  and  it'll  cost  me  fifty,  and  he  shows  me 
her  picture  and  the  dress  is  all  right,  and  she  had  a 
sad,  powerful  face,  and  the  date  is  set  and  everything. 

"Meantime,  I  keep  them  two  records  het  up  for 
the  benefit  of  my  reluctant  couple :  daytime  for  Nettie 
— she  standing  dreamy-eyed  while  it  was  doing, 
showing  she  was  coming  more  and  more  human, 
understand — and  evenings  for  both  of  'em,  when 
Chester  Timmins  would  call.  And  Chet  himself 
about  the  third  night  begins  to  get  a  new  look  in  his 
eyes,  kind  of  absent  and  desperate,  so  I  thinks  this 
here  lady  professional  will  simply  goad  him  to  a 
frenzy.  Oh,  we  had  some  sad  musical  week  before 
that  concert!  That  was  when  this  crazy  Chink  of 
mine  got  took  by  the  song.  He  don't  know  yet 
what  it  means,  but  it  took  him  all  right;  he  got 
regular  besotted  with  it,  keeping  the  kitchen  door 
open  all  the  time,  so  he  wouldn't  miss  a  single  turn. 
It  took  his  mind  off  his  work,  too.  Talk  about  the 
Yellow  Peril!  He  got  so  locoed  with  that  song  one 
day,  what  does  he  do  but  peel  and  cook  up  twelve 
dollars'  worth  of  the  Piedmont  Queen  dahlia  bulbs 
I'd  ordered  for  the  front  yard.  Sure!  Served  'em 
with  cream  sauce,  and  we  et  'em,  thinking  they 
was  some  kind  of  a  Chinese  vegetable. 

"  But  I  was  saying  about  this  new  look  in  Chester's 
eyes,  kind  of  far-off  and  criminal,  when  that  song  was 
playing.  And  then  something  give  me  a  pause,  as 


70  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

they  say.  Chet  showed  up  one  evening  with  his  nails 
all  manicured;  yes,  sir,  polished  till  you  needed 
smoked  glasses  to  look  at  'em.  I  knew  all  right 
where  he'd  been.  I  may  as  well  tell  you  that  Henry 
Lehman  was  giving  Red  Gap  a  flash  of  form  with  his 
new  barber  shop — tiled  floor,  plate-glass  front,  ex 
posed  plumbing,  and  a  manicure  girl  from  Seattle;  yes, 
sir,  just  like  in  the  great  wicked  cities.  It  had  already 
turned  some  of  our  very  best  homes  into  domestic 
hells,  and  no  wonder!  Decent,  God-fearing  men, 
who'd  led  regular  lives  and  had  whiskers  and  grown 
children,  setting  down  to  a  little  spindle-legged  table 
with  this  creature,  dipping  their  clumsy  old  hands  into 
a  pink  saucedish  of  suds  and  then  going  brazenly  back 
to  their  innocent  families  with  their  nails  glittering 
like  piano  keys.  Oh,  that  young  dame  was  bound 
to  be  a  social  pet  among  the  ladies  of  the  town, 
yes — no?  She  was  pretty  and  neat  figured,  with 
very  careful  hair,  though  its  colour  had  been  tam 
pered  with  unsuccessfully,  and  she  wore  little,  blue- 
striped  shirtwaists  that  fitted  very  close — you  know 
— with  low  collars.  It  was  said  that  she  was  a  good 
conversationalist  and  would  talk  in  low,  eager  tones 
to  them  whose  fingers  she  tooled. 

"Still,  I  didn't  think  anything  of  Chester  resorting 
to  that  sanitary  den  of  vice.  All  I  think  is  that  he's 
trying  to  pretty  himself  up  for  Nettie  and  maybe 
show  her  he  can  be  a  man-about-town,  like  them  she 
has  known  in  Spokane  and  in  Yonkers,  New  York, 
at  the  select  home  of  Mrs.  W.  B.  Hemingway  and  her 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  71 

husband.  How  little  we  think  when  we  had  ought  to 
be  thinking  our  darndest!  Me?  I  just  went  on 
playing  them  two  records,  the  male  barytone  and  the 
lady  mezzo,  and  trying  to  curse  that  Chinaman  into 
keeping  the  kitchen  door  shut  on  his  cooking,  with 
Wilbur  dropping  in  now  and  then  so  him  and  Nettie 
could  look  at  his  photo,  which  was  propped  up  against 
a  book  on  the  centre  table — one  of  them  large  three- 
dollar  books  that  you  get  stuck  with  by  an  agent  and 
never  read — and  Nettie  dropping  into  his  store  now 
and  then  to  hear  him  practise  over  difficult  bits  from 
his  piece  that  he  was  going  to  render  at  the  musical 
entertainment  for  the  Belgians,  with  him  asking  her 
if  she  thought  he  shaded  the  staccato  passage  a  mite 
too  heavy,  or  some  guff  like  that. 

"So  here  come  the  concert,  with  every  seat  sold  and 
the  hall  draped  pretty  with  flags  and  cut  flowers. 
Some  of  the  boys  was  down  from  the  ranch,  and  you 
bet  I  made  'em  all  come  across  for  tickets,  and  old 
Safety  First — Chet's  father — I  stuck  him  for  a  dollar 
one,  though  he  had  an  evil  look  in  his  eyes.  That's 
how  the  boys  got  so  crazy  about  this  here  song.  They 
brought  that  record  back  with  'em.  And  Buck  De- 
vine,  that  I  met  on  the  street  that  very  day  of  the 
concert,  he  give  me  another  kind  of  a  little  jolt.  He'd 
been  gosjiping  round  town,  the  vicious  way  men  do, 
and  he  says  to  me: 

"'That  Chester  lad  is  taking  awful  chances  for  a 
man  that  needs  his  two  hands  at  his  work.  Of  course 
if  he  was  a  foot-racer  or  something  like  that,  where  he 


72  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

didn't  need  hands '  'What's  all   this?'   I   asks. 

*  Why,'  says  Buck,  'he's  had  his  nails  rasped  down  to 
the  quick  till  he  almost  screams  if  they  touch  any 
thing,  and  he  goes  back  for  more  every  single  day. 
It's  a  wonder  they  ain't  mortified  on  him  already;  and 
say,  it  costs  him  six  bits  a  throw  and,  of  course,  he 
don't  take  no  change  from  a  dollar — he  leaves  the 
extra  two  bits  for  a  tip.  Gee!  A  dollar  a  day  for 
keeping  your  nails  tuned  up — and  I  ain't  sure  he 
don't  have  'em  done  twice  on  Sundays.  Mine  ain't 
never  had  a  file  teched  to  'em  yet,'  he  says.  'I  see 
that,'  I  says.  'If  any  foul-minded  person  ever 
accuses  you  of  it,  you  got  abundant  proofs  of  your 
innocence  right  there  with  you.  As  for  Chester,'  I 
says, '  he  has  an  object.'  '  He  has,'  says  Buck.  '  Not 
what  you  think,'  I  says.  'Very  different  from  that. 
It's  true,'  I  concedes,  'that  he  ought  to  take  that 
money  and  go  to  some  good  osteopath  and  have  his 
head  treated,  but  he's  all  right  at  that.  Don't  you 
set  up  nights  worrying  about  it.'  And  I  sent  Buck 
slinking  off  shamefaced  but  unconvinced,  I  could  see. 
But  I  wasn't  a  bit  scared. 

"Chet  et  supper  with  us  the  night  of  the  concert 
and  took  Nettie  and  I  to  the  hall,  and  you  bet  I 
wedged  them  two  close  in  next  each  other  when  we 
got  to  our  seats.  This  was  my  star  play.  If  they 

didn't  fall  for  each  other  now Shucks!    They 

had  to.  And  I  noticed  they  was  more  confidential 
already,  with  Nettie  looking  at  him  sometimes  al 
most  respectfully. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  73 

"Well,  the  concert  went  fine,  with  the  hired  lady 
professional  singer  giving  us  some  operatic  gems  in  var 
ious  foreign  languages  in  the  first  part,  and  Ed  Bug- 
halter  singing  "A  King  of  the  Desert  Am  I,  Ha,  Ha!" 
very  bass — Ed  always  sounds  to  me  like  moving  heavy 
furniture  round  that  ain't  got  any  casters  under  it— *- 
and  Mrs.  Dr.  Percy  Hailey  Martingale  with  the  "Jewel 
Song"  from  Faust,  that  she  learned  in  a  musical  con 
servatory  at  Pittsburgh,  Pennsylvania,  and  "Coming 
Through  the  Rye"  for  an  encore — holding  the  music 
rolled  up  in  her  hands,  though  the  Lord  knows  she 
knew  every  word  and  note  of  it  by  heart — and  the 
North  Side  Ladies'  String  Quartet,  and  Wilbur  Todd, 
of  course,  putting  on  more  airs  than  as  if  he  was  the 
only  son  of  old  man  Piano  himself,  while  he  shifted 
the  gears  and  pumped,  and  Nettie  whispering  that  he 
always  slept  two  hours  before  performing  in  public 
and  took  no  nourishment  but  one  cup  of  warm  milk 
— just  a  bundle  of  nerves  that  way — and  she  sent  him 
up  a  bunch  of  lilies  tied  with  lavender  ribbon  while  he 
was  bowing  and  scraping,  but  I  didn't  pay  no  atten 
tion  to  that,  for  now  it  was  coming. 

"Yes,  sir,  the  last  thing  was  this  here  lady  pro 
fessional,  getting  up  stern  and  kind  of  sweetish  sad  in 
her  low-cut  black  dress  to  sing  the  song  of  songs.  I 
was  awful  excited  for  a  party  of  my  age,  and  I  see 
they  was,  too.  Nettie  nudged  Chet  and  whispered, 
'Don't  you  just  love  it?'  And  Chet  actually  says, 
'I  love  it,'  so  no  wonder  I  felt  sure,  when  up  to  that 
time  he'd  hardly  been  able  to  say  a  word  except  about 


74  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

his  pa  being  willing  to  take  them  calves  for  almost 
nothing.  Then  I  seen  his  eyes  glaze  and  point  off 
across  the  hall,  and  darned  if  there  wasn't  this  mani 
cure  party  in  a  cheek  little  hat  and  tailored  gown,  set 
ting  with  Mrs.  Henry  Lehman  and  her  husband.  But 
still  I  felt  all  right,  because  him  and  Nettie  was  nudg 
ing  each  other  intimately  again  when  Professor 
Gluckstein  started  in  on  the  accompaniment — I  bet 
Wilbur  thinks  the  prof  is  awful  old-fashioned,  playing 
with  his  fingers  that  way;  I  know  they  don't  speak  on 
the  street. 

"So  this  lady  just  floated  into  that  piece  with  all 
the  heart  stops  pulled  out,  and  after  one  line  I  didn't 
begrudge  her  a  cent  of  my  fifty.  I  just  set  there  and 
thrilled.  I  could  feel  Nettie  and  Chet  thrilling,  too, 
and  I  says,  'There's  nothing  to  it — riot  from  now  on.' 

"The  applause  didn't  bust  loose  till  almost  a 
minute  after  she'd  kissed  the  cross  in  that  rich  brown 
voice  of  hers,  and  even  then  my  couple  didn't  join  in. 
Nettie  set  still,  all  frozen  and  star-eyed,  and  Chester 
was  choking  and  sniffling  awful  emotionally.  'I've 
sure  nailed  the  young  fools,'  I  thinks.  And,  of 
course,  this  lady  had  to  sing  it  again,  and  not  half 
through  was  she  when,  sure  enough,  I  glanced  down 
sideways  and  Chet's  right  hand  and  her  left  hand  is 
squirming  together  till  they  look  like  a  bunch  of  eels. 
'All  over  but  the  rice,'  I  says,  and  at  that  I  felt  so 
good  and  thrilled!  I  was  thinking  back  to  my  own 
time  when  I  was  just  husband-high,  though  that 
wasn't  so  little,  Lysander  John  being  a  scant  six  foot 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  75 

three — and  our  wedding  tour  to  the  Centennial  and 
the  trip  to  Niagara  Falls — just  soaking  in  old  memories 
that  bless  and  bind  that  this  lady  singer  was  calling 
up — well,  you  could  have  had  anything  from  me  right 
then  when  she  kissed  that  cross  a  second  time,  just 
pouring  her  torn  heart  out.  'Worth  every  cent  of 
that  fifty,'  I  says. 

"Then  everybody  was  standing  up  and  moving  out 
— wiping  their  eyes  a  lot  of  'em  was — so  I  push  on 
ahead  quick,  aiming  to  be  more  wily  than  ever  and 
leave  my  couple  alone.  They  don't  miss  me,  either. 
When  I  look  back,  darned  if  they  ain't  kind  of  shak 
ing  hands  right  there  in  the  hall.  'Quick  work!'  I 
says.  'You  got  to  hand  it  to  that  song.'  Even  then 
I  noticed  Nettie  was  looking  back  to  where  Wilbur 
was  tripping  down  from  the  platform,  and  Chester 
had  his  eyes  glazed  over  on  this  manicure  party. 
Still,  they  was  gripping  each  other's  hands  right  there 
before  folks,  and  I  think  they're  just  a  bit  embar 
rassed.  My  old  heart  went  right  on  echoing  that 
song  as  I  pushed  forward — not  looking  back  again,  I 
was  that  certain. 

"And  to  show  you  the  mushy  state  I  was  in,  here  is 
old  Safety  First  himself  leering  at  me  down  by  the 
door,  with  a  clean  shave  and  his  other  clothes  on,  and 
he  says  all  about  how  it  was  a  grand  evening's  musical 
entertainment  and  how  much  will  the  Belgians  get 
in  cold  cash,  anyway,  and  how  about  them  hundred 
and  fifty  head  of  bull  calves  that  he  was  willing  to 
take  off  my  hands,  and  me,  all  mushed  up  by  that 


76  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

song  as  I  am  telling  you,  saying  to  him  in  a  hearty 
manner,  'They're  yours,  Dave!  Take  'em  at  your 
own  price,  old  friend/  Honest,  I  said  it  just  that 
way,  so  you  can  see.  'Oh,  I'll  be  stuck  on  'em  at 
fifty  a  head,'  says  Dave,  'but  I  knew  you'd  listen 
to  reason,  we  being  such  old  neighbours.'  'I  ain't 
heard  reason  since  that  last  song,'  I  says.  T'm  listen 
ing  to  my  heart,  and  it's  a  grand  pity  yours  never 
learned  to  talk.'  'Fifty  a  head,'  says  the  old  robber. 

"So,  thus  throwing  away  at  least  fifteen  hundred 
dollars  like  it  was  a  mere  bagatelle  or  something,  I 
walk  out  into  the  romantic  night  and  beat  it  for  home, 
wanting  to  be  in  before  my  happy  couple  reached 
there,  so  they'd  feel  free  to  linger  over  their  parting. 
My,  but  I  did  feel  responsible  and  dangerous,  direct 
ing  human  destinies  so  brashly  the  way  I  had." 

There  was  a  pause,  eloquent  with  unworded 
emotions. 

Then  "Human  destinies,  hell!"  the  lady  at  length 
intoned. 

Hereupon  I  amazingly  saw  that  she  believed  her 
tale  to  be  done.  I  permitted  the  silence  to  go  a 
minute,  perhaps,  while  she  fingered  the  cigarette 
paper  and  loose  tobacco. 

"And  of  course,  then,"  I  hinted,  as  the  twin  jets  of 
smoke  were  rather  viciously  expelled. 

"I  should  say  so — 'of  course,  then* — you  got  it. 
But  I  didn't  get  it  for  near  an  hour  yet.  I  set  up  to 
my  bedroom  window  in  the  dark,  waiting  excitedly, 
and  pretty  soon  they  slowly  floated  up  to  the  front 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  77 

gate,  talking  in  hushed  tones  and  gurgles.  'Male 
and  female  created  He  them/  I  says,  flushed  with 
triumph.  The  moon  wasn't  up  yet,  but  you  hadn't 
any  trouble  making  out  they  was  such.  He  was 
acting  outrageously  like  a  male  and  she  was  suffering 
it  with  the  splendid  courage  which  has  long  dis 
tinguished  our  helpless  sex.  And  there  I  set,  warm 
ing  my  old  heart  in  it  and  expanding  like  one  of  them 
little  squeezed-up  sponges  you  see  in  the  drug-store 
window  which  swells  up  so  astonishing  when  you  put 
it  in  water.  I  wasn't  impatient  for  them  to  quit,  oh, 
no !  They  seemed  to  clench  and  unclench  and  clench 
again,  as  if  they  had  all  the  time  in  the  world — with 
me  doing  nothing  but  applaud  silently. 

"  After  spending  about  twenty  years  out  there  they 
loitered  softly  up  the  walk  and  round  to  the  side  door 
where  I'd  left  the  light  burning,  and  I  slipped  over  to 
the  side  window,  which  was  also  open,  and  looked 
down  on  the  dim  fond  pair,  and  she  finally  opened  the 
door  softly  and  the  light  shone  out." 

Again  Ma  Pettengill  paused,  her  elbows  on  the 
arms  of  her  chair,  her  shoulders  forward,  her  gray 
old  head  low  between  them.  She  drew  a  long  breath 
and  rumbled  fiercely: 

"And  the  mushy  fool  me,  forcing  that  herd  of 
calves  on  old  Dave  at  that  scandalous  price — after 
all,  that's  what  really  gaffed  me  the  worst!  My 
stars!  If  I  could  have  seen  that  degenerate  old 
crook  again  that  night — but  of  course  a  trade's  a 
trade,  and  I'd  said  it.  Ain't  I  the  old  silly ! " 


78  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"The  door  opened  and  the  light  shone  out " 

I  gently  prompted. 

She  erected  herself  in  the  chair,  threw  back  her 
shoulders,  and  her  wide  mouth  curved  and  lifted  at 
the  corners  with  the  humour  that  never  long  deserts 
this  woman. 

"Yep!  That  light  flooded  out  its  golden  rays  on 
the  reprehensible  person  of  C.  Wilbur  Todd,"  she 
crisply  announced.  "  And  like  they  say  in  the  stories, 
little  remains  to  be  told. 

"  I  let  out  a  kind  of  strangled  yell,  and  Wilbur  beat 
it  right  across  my  new  lawn,  and  I  beat  it  downstairs. 
But  that  girl  was  like  a  sleepwalker — not  to  be  talked 
to,  I  mean,  like  you  could  talk  to  persons. 

"'Aunty,'  she  says  in  creepy  tones,  'I  have  brought 
myself  to  the  ultimate  surrender.  I  know  the  chains 
are  about  me,  already  I  feel  the  shackles,  but  I  glory 
in  them.'  She  kind  of  gasped  and  shivered  in  horri 
ble  delight.  'I've  kissed  the  cross  at  last,'  she  mut 
ters. 

"I  was  so  weak  I  dropped  into  a  chair  and  I  just 
looked  at  her.  At  first  I  couldn't  speak,  then  I  saw 
it  was  no  good  speaking.  She  was  free,  white,  and 
twenty-one.  So  I  never  let  on.  I've  had  to  take  a 
jolt  or  two  in  my  time.  I've  learned  how.  But 
finally  I  did  manage  to  ask  how  about  Chet  Timmins. 

"'I  wronged  dear  Chester,'  she  says.  'I  admit  it 
freely.  He  has  a  heart  of  gold  and  a  nature  in  a 
thousand.  But,  of  course,  there  could  never  be 
anything  between  him  and  a  nature  like  mine;  our 


SHE  KIND  OF  GASPED  AND  SHIVERED  IN  HORRIBLE  DELIGHT 
*l'VE  KISSED  THE  CROSS  AT  LAST,'  SHE  MUTTERS*' 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  79 

egos  function  on  different  planes/  she  says.  'Dear 
Chester  came  to  see  it,  too.  It's  only  in  the  last  week 
we've  come  to  understand  each  other.  It  was  really 
that  wonderful  song  that  brought  us  to  our  mutual 
knowledge.  It  helped  us  to  understand  our  mutual 
depths  better  than  all  the  ages  of  eternity  could  have 
achieved.'  On  she  goes  with  this  mutual  stuff,  till 
you'd  have  thought  she  was  reading  a  composition 
or  something.  'And  dear  Chester  is  so  radiant  in 
his  own  new-found  happiness,'  she  says.  'What!' 
I  yells,  for  this  was  indeed  some  jolt. 

"'He  has  come  into  his  own,'  she  says.  'They 
have  eloped  to  Spokane,  though  I  promised  to  ob 
serve  secrecy  until  the  train  had  gone.  A  very 
worthy  creature  I  gather  from  what  Chester  tells  me, 
a  Miss  Macgillicuddy ' 

"'Not  the  manicure  party?'  I  yells  again. 

"'I  believe  she  has  been  a  wage-earner,'  says 
Nettie.  'And  dear  Chester  is  so  grateful  about 
that  song.  It  was  her  favourite  song,  too,  and  it 
seemed  to  bring  them  together,  just  as  it  opened  my 
own  soul  to  Wilbur.  He  says  she  sings  the  song  very 
charmingly  herself,  and  he  thought  it  preferable 
that  they  be  wed  in  Spokane  before  his  father  ob 
jected.  And  oh,  aunty,  I  do  see  how  blind  I  was  to 
my  destiny,  and  how  kind  you  were  to  me  in  my 
blindness — you  who  had  led  the  fuller  life  as  I  shall 
lead  it  at  Wilbur's  side.' 

"You  beat  it  to  your  room,'  I  orders  her,  very 
savage  and  disorganized.  For  I  had  stood  about 


80  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

all  the  jolts  in  one  day  that  God  had  meant  me  to. 
And  so  they  was  married,  Chester  and  his  bride 
attending  the  ceremony  and  Oscar  Teetz'  five-piece 

orchestra  playing  the "  She  broke  off,  with  a 

suddenly  blazing  glance  at  the  disk,  and  seized  it  from 
the  table  rather  purposefully.  With  a  hand  firmly  at 
both  edges  she  stared  inscrutably  at  it  a  long  moment. 

"I  hate  to  break  the  darned  thing,"  she  said 
musingly  at  last.  "I  guess  I'll  just  lock  it  up. 
Maybe  some  time  I'll  be  feeling  the  need  to  hear  it 
again.  I  know  I  can  still  be  had  by  it  if  all  the  cir 
cumstances  is  right." 

Still  she  stared  at  the  thing  curiously. 

"Gee!  It  was  hot  getting  them  calves  out  to-day, 
and  old  Safety  First  moaning  about  all  over  the  place 
how  he's  being  stuck  with  'em,  till  more  than  once  I 
come  near  forgetting  I  was  a  lady — and,  oh,  yes" — 
she  brightened — "I  was  going  to  tell  you.  After  it 
was  all  over,  Wilbur,  the  gallant  young  tone  poet, 
comes  gushing  up  to  me  and  says,  'Now,  aunty, 
always  when  you  are  in  town  you  must  drop  round 
and  break  bread  with  us.'  Aunty,  mind  you,  right 
off  the  reel.  'Well,'  I  says,  'if  I  drop  round  to  break 
any  bread  your  wife  bakes  I'll  be  sure  to  bring  a 
hammer.'  I  couldn't  help  it.  He'll  make  a  home 
for  the  girl  all  right,  but  he  does  something  sinful  to 
my  nerves  every  time  he  opens  his  face.  And  then 
coming  back  here,  where  I  looked  for  God's  peace 
and  quiet,  and  being  made  to  hear  that  darned  song 
every  time  I  turned  round! 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  81 

"I  give  orders  plain  enough,  but  say,  it's  like  a 
brush  fire — you  never  know  when  you  got  it  stamped 
out." 

From  the  kitchen  came  the  sound  of  a  dropped 
armful  of  stove  wood.  Hard  upon  this,  the  unctuous 
whining  tenor  of  Jimmie  Time: 

Oh-h-h  mem-o-reez  ihu-hat  blu-hess  and  bu-hurn  ! 

"You,  Jimmie  Time!"  It  is  a  voice  meant  for 
Greek  tragedy  and  a  theatre  open  to  the  heavens. 
I  could  feel  the  terror  of  the  aged  vassal. 

"Yes,  ma'am!"  The  tone  crawled  abasingly. 
"I  forgot  myself." 

I  was  glad,  and  I  dare  say  he  had  the  wit  to  be, 
that  he  had  not  to  face  the  menace  of  her  glare. 


Ill 

THE  REAL  PERUVIAN  DOUGHNUTS 

THE  affairs  of  Arrowhead  Ranch  are  ad 
ministered  by  its  owner,  Mrs.  Lysander 
John  Pettengill,  through  a  score  or  so  of 
hired  experts.  As  a  trout-fishing  guest  of  the  castle 
I  found  the  retainers  of  this  excellent  feudalism  in 
teresting  enough  and  generally  explicable.  But 
standing  out  among  them,  both  as  a  spectacle  and  by 
reason  of  his  peculiar  activities,  is  a  shrunken  little 
man  whom  I  would  hear  addressed  as  Jimmie  Time. 
He  alone  piqued  as  well  as  interested.  There  was  a 
tang  to  all  the  surmises  he  prompted  in  me. 

I  have  said  he  is  a  man;  but  wait!  The  years  have 
had  him,  have  scoured  and  rasped  and  withered  him; 
yet  his  face  is  curiously  but  the  face  of  a  boy,  his  eyes 
but  the  fresh,  inquiring,  hurt  eyes  of  a  boy  who  has 
been  misused  for  years  threescore.  Time  has  basely 
done  all  but  age  him.  So  much  for  the  wastrel  as 
Nature  has  left  him.  But  Art  has  furthered  the 
piquant  values  of  him  as  a  spectacle. 

In  dress,  speech,  and  demeanour  Jimmie  seems  to  be 
of  the  West,  Western — of  the  old,  bad  West  of  in 
formal  vendetta,  when  a  man's  increase  of  years 
might  lie  squarely  on  his  quickness  in  the  "draw"; 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  83 

when  he  went  abundantly  armed  by  day  and  slept 
lightly  at  night — trigger  fingers  instinctively  crooked. 
Of  course  such  days  have  very  definitely  passed; 
wherefore  the  engaging  puzzle  of  certain  survivals 
in  Jimmie  Time — for  I  found  him  still  a  two-gun  man. 
He  wore  them  rather  consciously  sagging  from  his 
lean  hips — almost  pompously,  it  seemed.  Nor  did  he 
appear  properly  unconscious  of  his  remaining  attire — 
of  the  broad-brimmed  hat,  its  band  of  rattlesnake 
skin;  of  the  fringed  buckskin  shirt,  opening  gallantly 
across  his  pinched  throat;  of  his  corduroy  trousers, 
fitting  bedraggled;  of  his  beautiful  beaded  moccasins. 

He  was  perfect  in  detail — and  yet  he  at  once 
struck  me  as  being  too  acutely  aware  of  himself. 
Could  this  suspicion  ensue,  I  wondered,  from  the  cir 
cumstance  that  the  light  duties  he  discharged  in  and 
about  the  Arrowhead  Ranch  house  were  of  a  semi- 
domestic  character;  from  a  marked  incongruity  in  the 
sight  of  him,  full  panoplied  for  homicide,  bearing  arm- 
fuls  of  wood  to  the  house;  or,  with  his  wicked  hat 
pulled  desperately  over  a  scowling  brow,  and  still 
with  his  flaunt  of  weapons,  engaging  a  sinkful  of 
soiled  dishes  in  the  kitchen  under  the  eyes  of  a  mere 
unarmed  Chinaman  who  sat  by  and  smoked  an  easy 
cigarette  at  him,  scornful  of  firearms? 

There  were  times,  to  be  sure,  when  Jimmie's  be 
haviour  was  in  nice  accord  with  his  dreadful  appear 
ance — as  when  I  chanced  to  observe  him  late  the 
second  afternoon  of  my  arrival.  Solitary  in  front  of 
the  bunk  house,  he  rapidly  drew  and  snapped  his  side 


84  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

arms  at  an  imaginary  foe  some  paces  in  front  of  him. 
They  would  be  simultaneously  withdrawn  from  their 
holsters,  fired  from  the  hip  and  replaced,  the  per 
former  snarling  viciously  the  while.  The  weapons 
were  unloaded,  but  I  inferred  that  the  foe  crumpled 
each  time. 

Then  the  old  man  varied  the  drama,  vastly  in 
creasing  the  advantage  of  the  foe  and  the  peril  of  his 
own  emergency  by  turning  a  careless  back  on  the 
scene.  The  carelessness  was  only  seeming.  Swiftly 
he  wheeled,  and  even  as  he  did  so  twin  volleys 
came  from  the  hip.  It  was  spirited — the  weapons 
seemed  to  smoke;  the  smile  of  the  marksman  was 
evil  and  masterly.  Beyond  all  question  the  foe  had 
crumpled  again,  despite  his  tremendous  advantage  of 
approach. 

I  drew  gently  near  before  the  arms  were  again 
bolstered  and  permitted  the  full  exposure  of  my  ad 
miration  for  this  readiness  of  retort  under  difficulties. 
The  puissant  one  looked  up  at  me  with  suspicion, 
hostile  yet  embarrassed.  I  stood  admiring  ingenu 
ously,  stubborn  in  my  fascination.  Slowly  I  won 
him.  The  coldness  in  his  bright  little  eyes  warmed 
to  awkward  but  friendly  apology. 

"A  gun  fighter  lets  hisself  git  stiff,"  he  winningly 
began;  "then,  first  thing  he  knows,  some  fine  day — 
crack!  Like  that!  All  his  own  fault,  too,  'cause  he 
ain't  kep'  in  trim."  He  jauntily  twirled  one  of  the 
heavy  revolvers  on  a  forefinger.  "Not  me,  though, 
pard!  Keep  m'self  up  and  comin',  you  bet!  Ketch 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  85 

me  not  ready  to  fan  the  old  forty-four!  I  guess  not! 
Some  has  thought  they  could.  Oh,  yes;  plenty  has 
thought  they  could.  Crack!  Like  that!"  He 
wheeled,  this  time  fatally  intercepting  the  foe  as  he 
treacherously  crept  round  a  corner  of  the  bunk  house. 
"Buryin'  ground  for  you,  mister!  That's  all — bury- 
in'  ground!" 

The  desperado  replaced  one  of  the  weapons  and 
patted  the  other  with  grisly  affection.  In  the  excess 
of  my  admiration  I  made  bold  to  reach  for  it.  He  re 
linquished  it  to  me  with  a  mother's  yearning.  And 
all  too  legible  in  the  polished  butt  of  the  thing  were 
notches!  Nine  sinister  notches  I  counted — not 
fresh  notches,  but  emphatic,  eloquent,  chilling.  I 
thrust  the  bloody  record  back  on  its  gladdened 
owner. 

"  Never  think  it  to  look  at  me?  "  said  he  as  our  eyes 
hung  above  that  grim  bit  of  bookkeeping. 

"Never!"  I  warmly  admitted. 

"Me — I  always  been  one  of  them  quiet,  mild- 
mannered  ones  that  you  wouldn't  think  butter  would 
melt  in  their  mouth — jest  up  to  a  certain  point.  Lots 
of  'em  fooled  that  way  about  me — jest  up  to  a  certain 
point,  mind  you — then,  crack!  Buryin'  ground — 
that's  all!  Never  go  huntin'  trouble — understand? 
But  when  it's  put  on  me — say!" 

He  lovingly  replaced  the  weapon — with  its  mortu 
ary  statistics — doffed  the  broad-brimmed  hat  with  its 
snake-skin  garniture,  and  placed  a  forefinger  athwart 
an  area  of  his  shining  scalp  which  is  said  by  a  certain 


86  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

pseudo-science  to  shield  several  of  man's  more  spirit 
ual  attributes.  The  finger  traced  an  ancient  but  still 
evil-looking  scar. 

"One  creased  me  there,"  he  confessed — "a  depity 
marshal — that  time  they  had  a  reward  out  for  me, 
dead  or  alive." 

I  was  for  details. 

"What  did  you  do?" 

Jimmie  Time  stayed  laconic. 

"Left  him  there— that's  all!" 

It  was  arid,  yet  somehow  informing.  It  conveyed 
to  me  that  a  marshal  had  been  cleverly  put  to  needing 
a  new  deputy. 

"Burying  ground?"  I  guessed. 

"That's  all!"  He  laughed  venomously — a  short, 
dry,  restrained  laugh.  "They  give  me  a  nickname," 
said  he.  "They  called  me  Little  Sure  Shot.  No 
wonder  they  did!  Ho!  I  should  think  they  would 
of  called  me  something  like  that."  He  lifted  his 
voice.  "  Hey !  Boogies ! " 

I  had  been  conscious  of  a  stooping  figure  in  the 
adjacent  vegetable  garden.  It  now  became  erect, 
a  figure  of  no  distinction — short,  rounded,  decked  in 
carelessly  worn  garments  of  no  elegance.  It  slouched 
inquiringly  toward  us  between  rows  of  sprouted  corn. 
Then  I  saw  that  the  head  surmounting  it  was  a  noble 
head.  It  was  uncovered,  burnished  to  a  half-circle 
of  grayish  fringe;  but  it  was  shaped  in  the  grand 
manner  and  well  borne,  and  the  full  face  of  it  was 
beautified  by  features  of  a  very  Roman  perfection. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  87 

It  was  the  face  of  a  judge  of  the  Supreme  Court  or 
the  face  of  an  ideal  senator.  His  large  grave  eyes 
bathed  us  in  a  friendly  regard;  his  full  lips  of  an  orator 
parted  with  leisurely  and  promising  unction.  I 
awaited  courtly  phrases,  richly  rounded  periods. 

"A  regular  hell-cat — what  he  is!" 

Thus  vocalized  the  able  lips.  Jimmie  Time  glowed 
modestly. 

"Show  him  how  I  can  shoot,"  said  he. 

The  amazing  Boogies  waddled — yet  with  dignity — 
to  a  point  ten  paces  distant,  drew  a  coin  from  the 
pocket  of  his  dingy  overalls,  and  spun  it  to  the  blue  of 
heaven.  Ere  it  fell  the  deadly  weapon  bore  swiftly 
on  it  and  snapped. 

"Crack!"  said  the  marksman  grimly. 

His  assistant  recovered  the  coin,  scrutinized  it 
closely,  rubbed  a  fat  thumb  over  its  supposedly 
dented  surface,  and  again  spun  it.  The  desperado 
had  turned  his  back.  He  drew  as  he  wheeled,  and 
again  I  was  given  to  understand  that  his  aim  had  been 
faultless. 

"Good  Little  Sure  Shot!"  declaimed  Boogies  ful- 
somely. 

"Hold  it  in  your  hand  oncet,"  directed  Little  Sure 
Shot.  The  intrepid  assistant  gallantly  extended  the 
half  dollar  at  arm's  length  between  thumb  and  finger 
and  averted  his  statesman's  face  with  practiced  ap 
prehension.  "Crack!"  said  Little  Sure  Shot,  and 
the  coin  seemed  to  be  struck  from  the  unscathed 
hand.  "Only  nicked  the  aidge  of  it,"  said  he, 


88  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

genially  deprecating.  "I  don't  like  to  take  no 
chancet  with  the  lad's  mitt." 

It  had  indeed  been  a  pretty  display  of  sharpshoot- 
ing — and  noiseless. 

"Had  me  nervous,  you  bet,  first  time  he  tried 
that,"  called  Boogies.  "Didn't  know  his  work  then. 
Thought  sure  he'd  wing  me." 

Jimmie  Time  loftily  ejected  imaginary  shells  from 
his  trusty  firearm  and  seemed  to  expel  smoke  from  its 
delicate  interior.  Boogies  waddled  his  approach. 

"Any  time  they  back  Little  Sure  Shot  up  against 
the  wall  they  want  to  duck,"  said  he  warmly.  "He 
has  'em  hard  to  find  in  about  a  minute.  Tell  him 
about  that  fresh  depity  marshal,  Jimmie." 

"I  already  did,"  said  Jimmie. 

"Ain't  he  the  hell-cat?"  demanded  Boogies,  mop 
ping  a  brow  that  Daniel  Webster  would  have  ob 
served  with  instant  and  perhaps  envious  respect. 

"I  been  a  holy  terror  in  my  time,  all  right,  all 
right!"  admitted  the  hero.  "Never  think  it  to  look 
at  me  though.  One  o'  the  deceivin'  kind  till  I'm  put 
upon ;  then — good-night ! ' ' 

"Jest  like  that!"  murmured  Boogies. 

"  Buryin'  ground— that's  all."  The  lips  of  the  bad 
man  shut  grimly  on  this. 

"Say,"  demanded  Boogies,  "on  the  level,  ain't  he 
the  real  Peruvian  doughnuts?  Don't  he  jest  make 
'em  all  hunt  their "  The  tribute  was  unfinished. 

"You  ol'  Jim!  You  oF  Jim  Time!"  Shrilly  this 
came  from  Lew  Wee,  Chinese  cook  of  the  Arrowhead 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  89 

framed  in  the  kitchen  doorway  of  the  ranch  house. 
He  brandished  a  scornful  and  commanding  dish 
towel  at  the  bad  man,  who  instantly  and  almost 
cravenly  cowered  under  the  distant  assault.  The 
garment  of  his  old  bad  past  fell  from  him,  leaving  him 
as  one  exposed  in  the  market-place  to  the  scornful 
towels  of  Chinamen.  "You  run,  ol'  Jim  Time! 
How  you  think  catch  'urn  din'  not  have  wood?" 

"Now  I  was  jest  goin'  to,"  mumbled  Jimmie  Time; 
and  he  amazingly  slunk  from  the  scene  of  his  late 
triumphs  toward  the  open  front  of  a  woodhouse. 

His  insulter  turned  back  to  the  kitchen  with  a 
final  affronting  flourish  of  the  towel.  The  whisper 
of  Boogies  came  hoarsely  to  me:  "Some  of  these 
days  Little  Sure  Shot' 11  put  a  dose  o'  cold  lead  through 
that  Chink's  heart." 

"Is  he  really  dangerous?"  I  demanded. 

"Dangerous!"  Boogies  choked  warmly  on  this. 
"Let  me  tell  you,  that  old  boy  is  the  real  Peruvian 
doughnuts,  and  no  mistake!  Some  day  there  won't 
be  so  many  Chinks  round  this  dump.  No,  sir-ee! 
That  little  cutthroat'll  have  another  notch  in  his 
gun." 

The  situation  did  indeed  seem  to  brim  with  the 
cheerfullest  promise;  yet  something  told  me  that 
Little  Sure  Shot  was  too  good,  too  perfect.  Some 
thing  warned  me  that  he  suffered  delusions  of  gran 
deur — that  he  fell,  in  fact,  somewhat  short  of  being 
the  real  doughnuts,  either  of  a  Peruvian  or  any  other 
valued  sort. 


90  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Nor  had  many  hours  passed  ere  it  befell  emphati 
cally  even  so.  There  had  been  the  evening  meal, 
followed  by  an  hour  or  so  of  the  always  pleasing  and 
often  instructive  talk  of  my  hostess,  Mrs.  Lysander 
John  Pettengill,  who  has  largely  known  life  for  sixty 
years  and  found  it  entertaining  and  good.  And  we 
had  parted  at  an  early  nine,  both  tired  from  the  work 
and  the  play  that  had  respectively  engaged  us  the 
day  long. 

My  candle  had  just  been  extinguished  when  three 
closely  fired  shots  cracked  the  vast  stillness  of  the 
night.  Ensued  vocal  explosions  of  a  curdling  shrill 
ness  from  the  back  of  the  house.  One  instantly  knew 
them  to  be  indignant  and  Chinese.  Caucasian  ears 
gathered  this  much.  I  looked  from  an  open  window 
as  the  impassioned  cries  came  nearer.  The  lucent 
moon  of  the  mountains  flooded  that  side  of  the  house, 
and  starkly  into  its  light  from  round  the  nearest 
corner  struggled  Lew  Wee,  the  Chinaman.  He 
shone  refulgent,  being  yet  in  the  white  or  full-dress 
uniform  of  his  calling. 

In  one  hand  he  held  the  best  gun  of  Jimmie  Time; 
in  the  other — there  seemed  to  be  a  well-gripped 
connection  with  the  slack  of  a  buckskin  shirt — 
writhed  the  alleged  real  doughnuts  of  a  possibly 
Peruvian  character.  The  captor  looked  aloft  and 
remained  vocal,  waving  the  gun,  waving  Jimmie 
Time,  playing  them  together  as  cymbals,  never  loos 
ening  them.  It  was  fine.  It  filled  the  eye  and  ap 
peased  the  deepest  longings  of  the  ear. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  91 

Then  from  a  neighbouring  window  projected  the 
heroic  head  and  shoulders  of  my  hostess,  and  there 
boomed  into  the  already  vivacious  libretto  a  passion 
ate  barytone,  or  thereabout,  of  sterling  timbre. 

"What  in  the  name  of " 

I  leave  it  there.  To  do  so  is  not  only  kind  but 
necessary.  The  most  indulgent  censor  that  ever 
guarded  the  columns  of  a  print  intended  for  young 
and  old  about  the  evening  lamp  would  swiftly  delete 
from  this  invocation,  if  not  the  name  of  Deity  itself, 
at  least  the  greater  number  of  the  attributes  with 
which  she  endowed  it.  A  few  were  conventional 
enough,  but  they  served  only  to  accentuate  others 
that  were  too  hastily  selected  in  the  heat  of  this 
crisis.  Enough  to  say  that  the  lady  overbore  by  sheer 
mass  of  tone  production  the  strident  soprano  of 
Lew  Wee,  controlling  it  at  length  to  a  lucid  disclosure 
of  his  grievance. 

From  the  doorway  of  his  kitchen,  inoffensively 
proffering  a  final  cigarette  to  the  radiant  night,  he 
had  been  the  target  of  three  shots  with  intent  to  kill. 
He  submitted  the  weapon.  He  submitted  the  writh 
ing  assassin. 

"I  catch  5um!"  he  said  effectively,  and  rested  his 
case. 

"Now — I  aimed  over  his  head."  It  was  Jimmie 
Time  alias  Little  Sure  Shot,  and  he  whimpered  the 
words.  "I  jest  went  to  play  a  sell  on  him." 

The  voice  of  the  judge  boomed  wrathfully  on  this: 

"You  darned  pestering  mischief,  you!    Ain't  I 


92  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

forbid  you  time  and  again  ever  to  load  them  guns? 
Where'd  you  get  the  ca'tridges?" 

"Now — I  found  'em,"  pleaded  the  bad  man.  "I 
did  so;  I  found  'em." 

"Cooned  'em,  you  mean!"  thundered  the  judge. 
"You  cooned  'em  from  Buck  or  Sandy.  Don't  tell 
me,  you  young  reprobate!" 

"He  all  like  bad  man,"  submitted  the  prosecution. 
"I  tell  'um  catch  stlovewood;  he  tell  'um  me:  'You 
go  to  haitch ! '  I  tell  'um :  *  You  ownself  go  to  haitch ! 
He  say:  *I  flan  you  my  gun  plitty  soon!'  He  do." 

"I  aimed  over  the  coward's  head,"  protested  the 
defendant. 

"Can  happen!"  sanely  objected  the  prosecution. 

"Ain't  I  told  you  what  I'd  do  if  you  loaded  them 
guns?"  roared  the  judge.  "Gentle,  limping,  bald- 
headed [Deleted  by  censor.]  "How  many 

more  times  I  got  to  tell  you?  Now  you  know  what 
you'll  get.  You'll  get  your  needings — that's  what 
you'll  get!  All  day  to-morrow!  You  hear  me? 
You'll  wear  'em  all  day  to-morrow!  Put  'em  on 
first  thing  in  the  morning  and  wear  'em  till  sundown. 
No  hiding  out,  neither!  Wear  'em  where  folks  can 
see  what  a  bad  boy  you  are.  And  swearing,  too! 
I  got  to  be  'shamed  of  you!  Yes,  sir!  Everybody '11 
know  how  'shamed  I  am  to  have  a  tough  kid  like 
you  on  the  place.  I  won't  be  able  to  hold  my  head 
up.  You  wear  'em!" 

"I — I — I  aimed  above "  Jimmie  Time  broke 

down.  He  was  weeping  bitterly.  His  captor  re- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  93 

leased  him  with  a  final  shake,  and  he  brought  a  fore 
arm  to  his  streaming  eyes. 

"You'll  wear  'em  all  day  to-morrow!"  again  thun 
dered  the  judge  as  the  culprit  sobbed  a  stumbling 
way  into  obscurity. 

"You'self  go  to  haitch!"  the  unrelenting  com 
plainant  called  after  him. 

The  judge  effected  a  rumbling  withdrawal.  The 
night  was  again  calm.  Then  I  slept  on  the  problem 
of  the  Arrowhead's  two-gun  bad  man.  It  seemed 
now  pretty  certain  that  the  fatuous  Boogies  had 
grossly  overpraised  him.  I  must  question  his  being 
the  real  doughnuts  of  any  sort — even  the  mildest — 
much  less  the  real  Peruvian.  But  what  was  "  'em" 
that  in  degrading  punishment  and  to  the  public 
shame  of  the  Arrowhead  he  must  wear  on  the  morrow? 
What,  indeed,  could  "'em"  be? 

I  woke,  still  pondering  the  mystery.  Nor  could 
I  be  enlightened  during  my  breakfast,  for  this  was 
solitary,  my  hostess  being  long  abroad  to  far  places 
of  the  Arrowhead,  and  the  stolid  mask  of  Lew  Wee 
inviting  no  questions. 

Breakfast  over,  I  stationed  myself  in  the  bracing 
sunlight  that  warmed  the  east  porch  and  aimlessly 
overhauled  a  book  of  flies.  To  three  that  had  proved 
most  popular  in  the  neighbouring  stream  I  did  small 
bits  of  mending,  ever  with  a  questing  eye  on  adjacent 
outbuildings,  where  Little  Sure  Shot — nee  Time — 
might  be  expected  to  show  himself,  wearing  "  'em." 

A  blank  hour  elapsed.     I  no  longer  affected  occu- 


94  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

pation  with  the  flies.  Jimmie  Time  was  irritating  me. 
Had  he  not  been  specifically  warned  to  "wear  'em" 
full  shamefully  in  the  public  eye?  Was  not  the 
public  eye  present,  avid?  Boogies  I  saw  intermit 
tently  among  beanpoles  in  the  garden.  He  appeared 
to  putter,  to  have  no  care  or  system  in  his  labour. 
And  at  moments  I  noticed  he  was  dropping  all  pre 
tense  of  this  to  stand  motionless,  staring  intently  at 
the  shut  door  of  the  stable. 

Could  his  fallen  idol  be  there,  I  wondered?  Pur 
posefully  I  also  watched  the  door  of  the  stable. 
Presently  it  opened  slightly;  then,  with  evident  in 
finite  caution,  it  was  pushed  outward  until  it  hung 
hah*  yawning.  A  palpitant  moment  we  gazed,  Boogies 
and  I.  Then  shot  from  the  stable  gloom  an  as 
tounding  figure  in  headlong  flight.  Its  goal  ap 
peared  to  be  the  bunk  house  fifty  yards  distant;  but 
its  course  was  devious,  laid  clearly  with  a  view  to 
securing  such  incidental  brief  shelter  as  would  be 
afforded  by  the  corral  wall,  by  a  meagre  clump  of 
buck-brush,  by  a  wagon,  by  a  stack  of  hay.  Good 
time  was  made,  however.  The  fugitive  vanished 
into  the  bunk  house  and  the  door  of  that  structure 
was  slammed  to.  But  now  the  small  puzzle  I  had 
thought  to  solve  had  grown  to  be,  in  that  brief  space 
— easily  under  eight  seconds — a  mystery  of  enormous, 
of  sheerly  inhuman  dimensions.  For  the  swift  and 
winged  one  had  been  all  too  plainly  a  correctly  uni 
formed  messenger  boy  of  the  Western  Union  Tele 
graph  Company — that  blue  uniform  with  metal 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  95 

buttons,  with  the  corded  red  at  the  trouser  sides,  the 
flat  cap  fronted  by  a  badge  of  nickel — unthinkable, 
yet  there.  And  the  speedy  bearer  of  this  scenic 
investiture  had  been  the  desperate,  blood-letting,  two- 
gun  bad  man  of  the  Arrowhead. 

It  was  a  complication  not  to  be  borne  with  any 
restraint.  I  hastened  to  stand  before  the  shut  door 
of  the  sanctuary.  It  slept  in  an  unpromising  stillness. 
Invincibly  reticent  it  seemed,  even  when  the  an 
guished  face  of  Jimmie  Time,  under  that  incredible 
cap  with  its  nickeled  badge,  wavered  an  instant  back 
of  the  grimy  window — wavered  and  vanished  with 
an  effect  of  very  stubborn  finality.  I  would  risk  no 
defeat  there.  I  passed  resolutely  on  to  Boogies, 
who  now  most  diligently  trained  up  tender  young 
bean  vines  in  the  way  they  should  go. 

"Why  does  he  hide  in  there?"  I  demanded  in  a 
loud,  indignant  voice.  I  was  to  have  no  nonsense 
about  it. 

Boogies  turned  on  me  the  slow,  lofty,  considering 
regard  of  a  United  States  senator  submitting  to 
photography  for  publication  in  a  press  that  has  no 
respect  for  private  rights.  He  lacked  but  a  few 
clothes  and  the  portico  of  a  capitol.  Speech  became 
immanent  in  him.  One  should  not  have  been  sur 
prised  to  hear  him  utter  decorative  words  meant 
for  the  rejoicing  and  incitement  of  voters.  Yet  he 
only  said — or  started  to  say: 

"Little  Sure  Shot'll  get  that  Chink  yet!  I  tell 
you,  now,  that  old  boy  is  sure  the  real  Peruvian " 


96  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

This  was  absurdly  too  much.  I  then  and  there 
opened  on  Boogies,  opened  flooding  gates  of  wrath 
and  scorn  on  him — for  him  and  for  his  idol  of  clay 
who,  I  flatly  told  him,  could  not  be  the  real  doughnuts 

of  any  sort.  As  for  his  being  the  real  Peruvian 

Faugh! 

Often  I  had  wished  to  test  in  speech  the  widely 
alleged  merits  of  this  vocable.  I  found  it  do  all  that 
has  been  claimed  for  it.  Its  effect  on  Boogies  was  so 
withering  that  I  used  it  repeatedly  in  the  next  three 
minutes.  I  even  faughed  him  twice  in  succession, 
which  is  very  insulting  and  beneficial  indeed,  and 
has  a  pleasant  feel  on  the  lips. 

"And  now  then,"  I  said,  "if  you  don't  give  me  the 
truth  of  this  matter  here  and  now,  one  of  us  two  is 
going  to  be  mighty  sorry  for  it." 

In  the  early  moments  of  my  violence  Boogies  had 
protested  weakly;  then  he  began  to  quiver  perilously. 
On  this  I  soothed  him,  and  at  the  precisely  right  mo 
ment  I  cajoled.  I  lured  him  to  the  bench  by  the 
corral  gate,  and  there  I  conferred  costly  cigarettes  on 
him  as  man  to  man.  Discreetly  then  I  sounded  for 
the  origins  of  a  certain  bad  man  who  had  a  way — 
even  though  they  might  crease  him — of  leaving 
deputy  marshals  where  he  found  them.  Boogies 
smoked  one  of  the  cigarettes  before  he  succumbed; 
but  first: 

"Let  me  git  my  work,"  said  he,  and  was  off  to  the 
bunk  house. 

I  observed  his  part  in  an  extended  parley  before 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  97 

the  door  was  opened  to  him.  He  came  to  me  on  the 
bench  a  moment  later,  bearing  a  ball  of  scarlet  yarn, 
a  large  crochet  hook  of  bone,  and  something  begun 
in  the  zephyr  but  as  yet  without  form. 

"I'm  making  the  madam  a  red  one  for  her  birth 
day,"  he  confided. 

He  bent  his  statesman's  head  above  the  task  and 
wrought  with  nimble  fingers  the  while  he  talked.  It 
was  difficult,  this  talk  of  his,  scattered,  fragmentary; 
and  his  mind  would  go  from  it,  his  voice  expire  un 
timely.  He  must  be  prompted,  recalled,  questioned. 
His  hands  worked  with  a  very  certain  skill,  but  in  his 
narrative  he  dropped  stitches.  Made  to  pick  these 
up,  the  result  was  still  a  droning  monotony  burdened 
with  many  ir relevancies.  I  am  loath  to  transcribe 
his  speech.  It  were  better  reported  with  an  eye 
strictly  to  salience. 

You  may  see,  then — and  I  hope  with  less  difficulty 
than  I  had  in  seeing — Jimmie  Time  and  Boogies 
on  night  duty  at  the  front  of  the  little  Western  Union 
Office  off  Park  Row  in  the  far  city  of  New  York. 
The  law  of  that  city  is  tender  to  the  human  young. 
Night  messenger  boys  must  be  adults.  It  is  one  of 
the  preliminary  shocks  to  the  visitor — to  ring  for 
the  messenger  boy  of  tradition  and  behold  in  his 
uniform  a  venerable  gentleman  with  perhaps  a 
flowing  white  beard.  I  still  think  Jimmie  Time  and 
Boogies  were  beating  the  law — on  a  technicality. 
Of  course  Jimmie  was  far  descended  into  the  vale  of 
years,  and  even  Boogies  was  forty — but  adults! 


98  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED^GAP 

It  is  three  o'clock  of  a  warm  spring  morning.  The 
two  legal  adults  converse  in  whispers,  like  bad  boys 
kept  after  school.  They  whisper  so  as  not  to  waken 
the  manager,  a  blase,  mature  youth  of  twenty  who 
sleeps  expertly  in  the  big  chair  back  of  the  railing. 
They  whisper  of  the  terrific  hazards  and  the  pre 
carious  rewards  of  their  adventurous  calling.  The 
hazards  are  nearly  all  provided  by  the  youngsters  who 
come  on  the  day  watch — hardy  ruffians  of  sixteen  or 
so  who  not  only  "pick  on"  these  two  but,  with  spor 
tive  affectations,  often  rob  them,  when  they  change 
from  uniform  to  civilian  attire,  of  any  spoil  the  night 
may  have  brought  them.  They  are  powerless  against 
these  aggressions.  They  can  but  whisper  their  indig 
nation. 

Boogies  eyed  the  sleeping  manager. 

"I  struck  it  fine  to-night,  Jimmie!"  he  whispered. 
Jimmie  mutely  questioned.  "Got  a  whole  case  note. 
You  know  that  guy  over  to  the  newspaper  office — 
the  one  that's  such  a  tank  drama — he  had  to  send  a 
note  up  to  a  girl  in  a  show  that  he  couldn't  be  there." 

"That  tank  drama?  Sure,  I  know  him.  He  kids 
me  every  time  he's  stewed." 

"He  kids  me,  too,  something  fierce;  and  he  give 
me  the  case  note." 

"Them  strong  arms'll  cop  it  on  you  when  they 
get  here,"  warned  Jimmie. 

"Took  my  collar  off  and  hid  her  on  the  inside  of  it. 
Oh,  I  know  tricks!" 

"  Chee !    You're  all  to  the  Wall  Street ! " 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  99 

"I  got  to  look  out  for  my  stepmother,  too.  She'd 
crown  me  with  a  chair  if  she  thought  I  held  out  on 
her.  Beans  me  about  every  day  just  for  nothing 
anyway." 

"Don't  you  stand  for  it!" 

"Yah!  All  right  for  you  to  talk.  You're  the 
lucky  guy.  You're  an  orphan.  S'pose  you  had  a 
stepmother!  I  wish  I  was  an  orphan." 

Jimmie  swelled  with  the  pride  of  orphanship. 

"Yes;  I'd  hate  to  have  any  parents  knocking  me 
round,"  he  said.  "But  if  it  ain't  a  stepmother  then 
it's  somebody  else  that  beans  you.  A  guy  in  this 
burg  is  always  getting  knocked  round  by  somebody." 

"Read  some  more  of  the  novel,"  pleaded  Boogies, 
to  change  the  distressing  topic. 

Jimmie  drew  a  tattered  paper  romance  from  the 
pocket  of  his  faded  coat  and  pushed  the  cap  back 
from  his  seamed  old  forehead.  It  went  back  easily, 
having  been  built  for  a  larger  head  than  his.  He 
found  the  place  he  had  marked  at  the  end  of  his 
previous  half-hour  with  literature.  Boogies  leaned 
eagerly  toward  him.  He  loved  being  read  to.  Doing 
it  himself  was  too  slow  and  painful: 

"'No,'  said  our  hero  in  a  clear,  ringing  voice;  'all 
your  tainted  gold  would  not  keep  me  here  in  the  foul, 
crowded  city.  I  must  have  the  free,  wild  life  of  the 
plains,  the  canter  after  the  Texas  steers,  and  the 
fierce  battles  with  my  peers.  For  me  the  boundless, 
the  glorious  West!'" 

"Chee!     It  must  be  something  grand — that  wild 


100  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

life!"  interrupted  Boogies.  "That's  the  real  stuff— 
the  cowboy  and  trapper  on  them  peraries,  hunting 
bufflers  and  Injuns.  I  seen  a  film " 

Jimmie  Time  frowned  at  this.  He  did  not  like 
interruptions.  He  firmly  resumed  the  tale: 

"With  a  gesture  of  disdain  our  hero  waved  aside 
the  proffered  gold  of  the  scoundrelly  millionaire  and 
dashed  down  the  stairway  of  the  proud  mansion  to 
where  his  gallant  steed,  Midnight,  was  champing 
at  the  hitching  post.  At  that  moment " 

Romance  was  snatched  from  the  hands  of  Jimmie 
Time.  The  manager  towered  above  him. 

"Ain't  I  told  you  guys  not  to  be  taking  up  the 
company's  time  with  them  novels?"  he  demanded. 
He  sternly  returned  to  his  big  chair  behind  the  rail 
ing,  where  he  no  less  sternly  took  up  his  own  perusal 
of  the  confiscated  tale. 

"The  big  stiff!"  muttered  Jimmie.  "That's  the 
third  one  he's  copped  on  me  this  week.  A  kid  in 
this  choint  ain't  got  no  rights!  I  got  a  good  notion 
to  throw  'em  down  cold  and  go  with  the  Postal 
people." 

"Never  mind!  I'll  blow  you  to  an  ice  cream  after 
work,"  consoled  Boogies. 

"Ice  cream!"  Jimmie  Time  was  contemptuous. 
"I  want  the  free,  wild  life  of  the  boundless  peraries. 
I  want  b'ar  steaks  br'iled  on  the  glowing  coals  of  the 
camp  fire.  I  want  to  be  Little  Sure  Shot,  trapper, 
scout,  and  guide " 

"  Next  out ! "  yelled  the  manager.     "  Hustle  now ! " 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          .101 

Jimmie  Time  was  next  out.     He  hustled  sullenly. 

Boogies,  alone,  slept  fitfully  on  his  bench  until  the 
young  thugs  of  the  day  watch  straggled  in.  Then 
he  achieved  the  change  of  his  uniform  to  civilian 
garments,  with  only  the  accustomed  minor  maltreat 
ment  at  the  hands  of  these  tormentors.  True,  with 
sportive  affectations — yet  with  deadly  intentness — 
they  searched  him  for  possible  loot;  but  only  his 
pockets.  His  dollar  bill,  folded  inside  his  collar, 
went  unfound.  With  assumed  jauntiness  he  strolled 
from  the  outlaws'  den  and  safely  reached  the  street. 

The  gilding  on  the  castellated  towers  of  the  tallest 
building  in  the  world  dazzled  his  blinking,  foolish 
eyes.  That  was  a  glorious  summit  which  sang  to  the 
new  sun,  but  no  higher  than  his  own  elation  at  the 
moment.  Had  he  not  come  off  with  his  dollar?  He 
found  balm  and  a  tender  stimulus  in  the  morning  air 
— an  air  for  dreams  and  revolt.  Boogies  felt  this  as 
thousands  of  others  must  have  felt  it  who  were  yet 
tamely  issuing  from  subway  caverns  and  the  Brook 
lyn  Bridge  to  be  wage  slaves. 

A  block  away  from  the  office  he  encountered  Jim 
mie  Time,  who  seemed  to  await  him  importantly. 
He  seethed  with  excitement. 

"  I  got  one,  too ! "  he  called.  "That  tank  drama  he 
sent  another  note  uptown  to  a  restaurant  where  a 
party  was,  and  he  give  me  a  case  note,  too." 

He  revealed  it;  and  when  Boogies  withdrew  his  own 
treasure  the  two  were  lovingly  compared  and  ad 
mired.  Nothing  in  all  the  world  can  be  so  foul  to 


102  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

the  touch  as  the  dollar  bill  that  circulates  in  New 
York,  but  these  two  were  intrepidly  fondled. 

"I  ain't  going  back  to  change,"  said  Jimmie  Time. 
"Them  other  kids  would  cop  it  on  me." 

"Have  some  cigarettes,"  urged  Boogies,  and 
royally  bought  them — with  gilded  tips,  hi  a  beautiful 
casket. 

"I  had  about  enough  of  their  helling,"  declared 
Jimmie,  still  glowing  with  a  fine  desperation. 

They  sought  the  William  Street  Tunnel  under  the 
Brooklyn  Bridge.  It  was  cool  and  dark  there.  One 
might  smoke  and  take  his  ease.  And  plan!  They 
sprawled  on  the  stone  pavement  and  smoked  largely. 

"Chee!  If  we  could  get  out  West  and  do  all  them 
fine  things!"  mused  Boogies. 

" Let's!"  said  Jimmie  Time. 

"  Huh!"  Boogies  gasped  blankly  at  this. 

"Let's  beat  it!" 

"Chee!"  said  Boogies.  He  stared  at  this  bolder 
spirit  with  startled  admiration. 

"Me — I'm  going,"  declared  Jimmie  Time  stoutly, 
and  waited. 

Boogies  wavered  a  tremulous  moment. 

"  I'm  going  with  you,"  he  managed  at  last. 

He  blurted  the  words.  They  had  to  rush  out  to 
beat  down  his  native  caution  with  quick  blows. 

"Listen!"  said  Jimmie  Time  impressively.  "We 
got  money  enough  to  start.  Then  we  just  strike 
out  for  the  peraries." 

"Like  the  guy  in  the  story ! "    Boogies  glowed  at  the 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  103 

adept  who  before  his  very  eyes  was  turning  a  beauti 
ful  dream  into  stark  reality.  He  was  praying  that  his 
own  courage  to  face  it  would  endure. 

"  You  hurry  home,"  commanded  Jimmie,  "and  cop 
an  axe  and  all  the  grub  you  can  lay  your  hands 


on." 


Boogies  fell  from  the  heights  as  he  had  feared  he 
would. 

"Aw,  chee!"  he  said  sanely.  "And  s'pose  me 
stepmother  gets  her  lamps  on  me!  Wouldn't  she 
bean  me?  Sure  she  would !" 

"  Bind  her  and  gag  her,"  said  Jimmie  promptly. 
"What's  one  weak  woman?" 

"  Yah!     She's  a  hellion  and  you  know  it." 

"  Listen!"  said  Jimmie  sternly.  "  If  you're  going 
into  the  wild  and  lawless  life  of  the  peraries  with  me 
you  got  to  learn  to  get  things.  Jesse  James  or 
Morgan's  men  could  get  me  that  axe  and  that  grub, 
and  not  make  one-two-three  of  it." 

"  Them  guys  had  practice — and  likely  they  never 
had  to  go  against  their  stepmothers." 

"Do  I  go  alone,  then?" 

"Well,  now " 

"  Will  you  or  won't  you?" 

Boogies  drew  a  fateful  breath. 

"I'll  take  a  chan.ce.  You  wait  here.  If  I  ain't 
back  in  one  hour  you'll  know  I  been  murdered." 

"  Good,  my  man!"  said  Jimmie  Time  with  the  air 
of  an  outlaw  chief.  "  Be  off  at  once." 

Boogies  was  off.    And  Boogies  was  back  in  less 


104  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

than  the  hour  with  a  delectable  bulging  meal  sack. 
He  was  trembling  but  radiant. 

"  She  seen  me  gitting  away  and  she  yelled  her  head 
off,"  he  gasped;  "but  you  bet  I  never  stopped.  I 
just  thought  of  Jesse  James  and  General  Grant,  and 
run  like  hell!" 

"Good,  my  man!"  said  Jimmie  Time;  and  then, 
with  a  sudden  gleam  of  the  practical,  he  inventoried 
the  commissary  and  quartermaster  supplies  in  the 
sack.  He  found  them  to  be:  One  hatchet;  one  well- 
used  boiled  hambone;  six  greasy  sugared  crullers; 
four  dill  pickles;  a  bottle  of  catchup;  two  tomatoes 
all  but  obliterated  in  transit;  two  loaves  of  bread;  a 
flatiron. 

Jimmie  cast  the  last  item  from  him. 

"  Wh'd  you  bring  that  for?"  he  demanded. 

"  I  don't  know,"  confessed  Boogies.  "  I  just  put 
it  in.  Mebbe  I  was  afraid  she'd  throw  it  at  me  when 
I  was  making  my  get-away.  It'll  be  good  for  crack 
ing  nuts  if  we  find  any  on  the  peraries.  I  bet  they 
have  nuts!" 

"All  right,  then.  You  can  carry  it  if  you  want  to, 
pard." 

Jimmie  thrust  the  bundle  into  Boogies'  arms  and 
valiantly  led  a  desperate  way  to  the  North  River. 
Boogies  panted  under  his  burden  as  they  dodged 
impatient  taxicabs.  So  they  came  into  the  maze  of 
dock  traffic  by  way  of  Desbrosses  Street.  The  eyes 
of  both  were  lit  by  adventure.  Jimmie  pushed 
through  the  crowd  on  the  wharf  to  a  ticket  office.  A 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  105 

glimpse  through  a  door  of  the  huge  shed  had  given 
him  inspiration.  No  common  ferryboats  for  them! 
He  had  seen  the  stately  river  steamer,  Robert  Fulton, 
gay  with  flags  and  bunting,  awaiting  the  throng  of 
excursionists.  He  recklessly  bought  tickets.  So  far, 
so  good.  A  momentous  start  had  been  made. 

At  this  very  interesting  point  in  his  discourse  to  me, 
however,  Boogies  began  to  miss  explosions  too  fre 
quently.  From  the  disorderly  jumble  of  his  nar 
rative  to  this  moment  I  believe  I  have  brought 
something  like  the  truth;  I  have  caused  the  widely 
scattered  parts  to  cohere.  After  this  I  could  make 
little  of  his  maunderings. 

They  were  on  the  crowded  boat  and  the  boat 
steamed  up  the  Hudson  River;  and  they  disembarked 
at  a  thriving  Western  town — which,  I  gather,  was 
Yonkers — because  Boogies  feared  his  stepmother 
might  trace  him  to  this  boat,  and  because  Jimmie 
Time  became  convinced  that  detectives  were  on  his 
track,  wanting  him  for  the  embezzlement  of  a  worn 
but  still  practicable  uniform  of  the  Western  Union 
Telegraph  Company.  So  it  was  agreed  that  they 
should  take  to  the  trackless  forest,  where  there  are 
ways  of  throwing  one's  pursuers  off  the  scent;  where 
they  would  travel  by  night,  guided  by  the  stars,  and 
lay  up  by  day,  subsisting  on  spring  water  and  a  little 
pemmican — source  undisclosed.  They  were  not  go 
ing  to  be  taken  alive — that  was  understood. 

They  hurried  through  the  streets  of  this  thriving 
Western  town,  ultimately  boarding  an  electric  car 


106          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

— with  a  shrewd  eye  out  for  the  hellhounds  of  the 
law;  and  the  car  took  them  to  the  beginning  of  the 
frontier,  where  they  found  the  trackless  forest. 
They  reached  the  depths  of  this  forest  after  climbing 
a  stone  wall;  and  Jimmie  Time  said  the  West  looked 
good  to  him  and  that  he  could  already  smell  the 
"b'ar  steaks  br'iling." 

Plain  enough  still,  perhaps;  but  immediately  it 
seemed  that  a  princess  had  for  some  time  been  shar 
ing  this  great  adventure.  She  was  a  beautiful 
golden-haired  princess,  though  quite  small,  and  had 
flowers  in  her  hair  and  put  some  in  the  cap  of  Jimmie 
Time — behind  the  nickel  badge — and  said  she  would 
make  him  her  court  dwarf  or  jester  or  knight,  or 
something;  only  the  scout  who  was  with  her  said  this 
was  rather  silly  and  that  they  had  better  be  getting 
home  or  they  knew  very  well  what  would  happen  to 
them.  But  when  they  got  lost  Jimmie  Time  looked 
at  this  scout's  rifle  and  said  it  was  a  first-class  rifle, 
and  would  knock  an  Indian  or  a  wild  animal  silly. 

And  the  scout  smoked  a  cigarette  and  got  sick  by 
it,  and  cried  something  fierce;  so  they  made  a  fire,  and 
the  princess  didn't  get  sick  when  she  smoked  hers,  but 
told  them  a  couple  of  bully  stories,  like  reading  in  a 
book,  and  ate  every  one  of  the  greasy  sugared  crullers, 
because  she  was  a  genuine  princess,  and  Boogies 
thought  at  this  time  that  maybe  the  boundless  West 
wasn't  what  it  was  cracked  up  to  be;  so,  after  they 
met  the  madam,  the  madam  said,  well,  if  they  was 
wanting  to  go  out  West  they  might  as  well  come  along 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  107 

here;  and  they  said  all  right — as  long  as  they  was 
wanting  to  go  out  West  anyway,  why,  they  might  as 
well  come  along  with  her  as  with  anybody  else. 

And  that  Chink  would  mighty  soon  find  out  if 
Little  Sure  Shot  wasn't  the  real  Peruvian  doughnuts, 
because  that  old  murderer  would  sure  have  him  hard 
to  find,  come  sundown;  still,  he  was  glad  he  had  come 
along  with  the  madam,  because  back  there  it  wasn't 
any  job  for  you,  account  of  getting  too  fat  for  the 
uniform,  with  every  one  giving  you  the  laugh  that 
way — and  they  wouldn't  get  you  a  bigger  one 

I  left  Boogies  then,  though  he  seemed  not  to  know 
it.  His  needle  worked  swiftly  on  the  red  one  he  was 
making  for  the  madam,  and  his  aimless,  random 
phrases  seemed  to  flow  as  before;  but  I  knew  now 
where  to  apply  for  the  details  that  had  been  too  many 
for  his  slender  gift  of  narrative. 

At  four  that  afternoon  Mrs.  Lysander  John  Petten- 
gill,  accompanied  by  one  Buck  Devine,  a  valued  re 
tainer,  rode  into  the  yard  and  dismounted.  She  at 
once  looked  searchingly  about  her.  Then  she  raised 
her  voice,  which  is  a  carrying  voice  even  when  not 
raised:  "You,  Jimmie  Time!" 

Once  was  enough.  The  door  of  the  bunk  house 
swung  slowly  open  and  the  disgraced  one  appeared 
in  all  his  shameful  panoply.  The  cap  was  pulled 
well  down  over  a  face  hopelessly  embittered.  The 
shrunken  little  figure  drooped. 

"None  of  that  hiding  out!"  admonished  his  judge. 
"You  keep  standing  round  out  here  where  decent 


108  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

folks  can  look  at  you  and  see  what  a  bad  boy  you 


are." 


With  a  glance  she  identified  me  as  one  of  the  de 
cent  she  would  have  edified.  Jimmie  Time  muttered 
evilly  in  undertones  and  slouched  forward,  head 
down. 

"Ain't  he  the  hostile  wretch?"  called  Buck  Devine, 
who  stood  with  the  horses.  He  spoke  with  a  florid 
but  false  admiration. 

Jimmie  Time,  snarling,  turned  on  him: 

"You  go  to " 

I  perceived  that  Lew  Wee  the  night  before  had 
delicately  indicated  by  a  mere  initial  letter  a  bad 
word  that  could  fall  trippingly  from  the  lips  of 
Jimmie. 

"Sure!"  agreed  Buck  Devine  cordially.  "And 
say,  take  this  here  telegram  up  to  the  corner  of 
Broadway  and  Harlem;  and  move  lively  now — don't 
you  stop  to  read  any  of  them  nickel  liberries." 

I  saw  what  a  gentleman  should  do.  I  turned  my 
back  on  the  piteous  figure  of  Jimmie  Time.  I  moved 
idly  off,  as  if  the  spectacle  of  his  ignominy  had  never 
even  briefly  engaged  me. 

"Shoot  up  a  good  cook,  will  you?"  said  the  lady 
grimly.  "I'll  give  you  your  needings."  She  fol 
lowed  me  to  the  house. 

On  the  west  porch,  when  she  had  exchanged  the 
laced  boots,  khaki  riding  breeches,  and  army  shirt  for 
a  most  absurdly  feminine  house  gown,  we  had  tea. 
Her  nose  was  powdered,  and  her  slippers  were 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  109 

bronzed  leather  and  monstrous  small.  She  mingled 
Scotch  whiskey  with  the  tea  and  drank  her  first  cup 
ful  from  a  capacious  saucer. 

"That  fresh  bunch  of  campers!"  she  began. 
"What  you  reckon  they  did  last  night?  Cut  my 
wire  fence  in  two  places  over  on  the  west  flat — yes, 
sir! — had  a  pair  of  wire  clippers  in  the  whip  socket. 
What  I  didn't  give  'em!  Say,  ain't  it  a  downright 
wonder  I  still  retain  my  girlish  laughter?" 

But  then,  after  she  had  refused  my  made  cigarette 
for  one  of  her  own  deft  handiwork,  she  spoke  as  I 
wished  her  to: 

"Yes;  three  years  ago.  Me  visiting  a  week  at  the 
home  of  Mrs.  W.  B.  Hemingway  and  her  husband, 
just  outside  of  Yonkers,  back  in  York  State.  A  very 
nice  swell  home,  with  a  nice  front  yard  and  every 
thing.  And  also  Mrs.  W.  B.'s  sister  and  her  little 
boy,  visiting  her  from  Albany,  the  sister's  name 
being  Mrs.  L.  H.  Cummins,  and  the  boy  being  nine 
years  old  and  named  Rupert  Cummins,  Junior;  and 
very  junior  he  was  for  his  age,  too — I  will  say  that. 
He  was  a  perfectly  handsome  little  boy;  but  you 
might  call  him  a  blubberhead  if  you  wanted  to,  him 
always  being  scared  silly  and  pestered  and  rough- 
housed  out  of  his  senses  by  his  little  girl  cousin, 
Margery  Hemingway — Mrs.  W.  B.'s  little  girl,  you 
understand — and  her  only  seven,  or  two  years 
younger  than  Junior,  but  leading  him  round  into  all 
kinds  of  musses  till  his  own  mother  was  that  de 
moralized  after  a  couple  of  days  she  said  if  that  Mar- 


110          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

gery  child  was  hers  she'd  have  her  put  away  in  some 
good  institution. 

"Of  course  she  only  told  that  to  me,  not  to  Mar 
gery's  mother.  I  don't  know — mebbe  she  would  of 
put  her  away,  she  was  that  frightened  little  Margery 
would  get  Junior  killed  off  in  some  horrible  manner, 
like  the  time  she  got  him  to  see  how  high  he  dast  jump 
out  of  the  apple  tree  from,  or  like  the  time  she  told 
him,  one  ironing  day,  that  if  he  drank  a  whole  bowl 
ful  of  starch  it  would  make  him  have  whiskers  like  his 
pa  in  fifteen  minutes.  Things  like  that — not  fatal, 
mebbe,  but  wearing. 

"Well,  this  day  come  a  telegram  about  nine  A.  M. 
for  Mrs.  W.  B.,  that  her  aunt,  with  money,  is  very 
sick  in  New  Jersey,  which  is  near  Yonkers;  so  she  and 
Mrs.  L.  H.  Cummins,  her  sister,  must  go  to  see  about 
this  aunt — and  would  I  stay  and  look  after  the  two 
kids  and  not  let  them  get  poisoned  or  killed  or  any 
thing  serious?  And  they  might  have  to  stay  over 
night,  because  the  aunt  was  eccentric  and  often 
thought  she  was  sick;  but  this  time  she  might  be 
right.  She  was  worth  all  the  way  from  three  to  four 
hundred  thousand  dollars. 

"So  I  said  I'd  love  to  stay  and  look  after  the  little 
ones.  I  wanted  to  stay.  Shopping  in  New  York 
City  the  day  before,  two  bargain  sales — one  being 
hand-embroidered  Swiss  waists  from  two-ninety-eight 
upward — I  felt  as  if  a  stampede  of  longhorns  had 
caught  me.  Darned  near  bedfast  I  was!  Say,  talk 
about  the  pale,  weak,  nervous  city  woman  with  ex- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  111 

hausted  vitality!  See  'em  in  action  first,  say  I. 
There  was  a  corn-fed  hussy  in  a  plush  bonnet  with 
forget-me-nots,  two  hundred  and  thirty  or  forty  on 
the  hoof,  that  exhausted  my  vitality  all  right — no 
holds  barred,  an  arm  like  first-growth  hick'ry  across 
my  windpipe,  and  me  up  against  a  solid  pillar  of 
structural  ironwork!  Once  I  was  wrastled  by  a  cin 
namon  bear  that  had  lately  become  a  mother;  but 
the  poor  old  thing  would  have  lost  her  life  with  this 
dame  after  the  hand-embroidereds.  Gee!  I  was 
lame  in  places  I'd  lived  fifty-eight  years  and  never 
knew  I  had. 

"So  off  went  these  ladies,  with  Mrs.  L.  H.  Cum 
mins  giving  me  special  and  private  warning  to  be  sure 
and  keep  Junior  well  out  of  it  in  case  little  mis 
chievous  Margery  started  anything  that  would  be 
likely  to  kill  her.  And  I  looked  forward  to  a  quiet 
day  on  the  lounge,  where  I  could  ache  in  peace  and 
read  the  "Famous  Crimes  of  History,"  which  the  W. 
B.'s  had  in  twelve  volumes — you  wouldn't  have 
thought  there  was  that  many,  would  you?  I  dressed 
soft,  out  of  respect  to  my  corpse,  and  picked  out  a 
corking  volume  of  these  here  Crimes  and  lay  on  the 
big  lounge  by  an  open  window  where  the  breeze  could 
soothe  me  and  where  I  could  keep  tabs  on  the  little 
ones  at  their  sports;  and  everything  went  as  right  as 
if  I  had  been  in  some  A-Number-One  hospital  where 
I  had  ought  to  of  been. 

"Lunchtime  come  before  I  knew  it;  and  I  had  mine 
brought  to  my  bed  of  pain  by  the  Swede  on  a  tray, 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED.  GAP 

while  the  kids  et  theirs  in  an  orderly  and  uproarious 
manner  in  the  dining-room.  Rupert,  Junior,  was 
dressed  like  one  of  these  boy  scouts  and  had  his  air 
gun  at  the  table  with  him,  and  little  Margery  was 
telling  him  there  was,  too,  fairy  princes  all  round  in 
different  places;  and  she  bet  she  could  find  one  any 
day  she  wanted  to.  They  seemed  to  be  all  safe 
enough,  so  I  took  up  my  Crimes  again.  Really,  ain't 
history  the  limit? — the  things  they  done  in  it  and  got 
away  with — never  even  being  arrested  or  fined  or 
anything! 

"Pretty  soon  I  could  hear  the  merry  prattle  of  the 
little  ones  again  out  in  the  side  yard.  Ain't  it  funny 
how  they  get  the  gambling  spirit  so  young?  I'd  hear 
little  Margery  say :  '  I  bet  you  can't ! '  And  Rupert, 
Junior,  would  say : '  I  bet  I  can,  too ! '  And  off  they'd 
go  ninety  miles  on  a  straight  track:  'I  bet  you'd  be 
afraid  to!'— 'I  bet  I  wouldn't  be!'— 'I  bet  you'd 
run  as  fast!' — 'I  bet  I  never  would!'  Ever  see  such 
natural-born  gamblers?  And  it's  all  about  what 
Rupert,  Junior,  would  do  if  he  seen  a  big  tiger  in  some 
woods — Rupert  betting  he'd  shoot  it  dead,  right  be 
tween  the  eyes,  and  Margery  taking  the  other  end. 
She  has  by  far  the  best  end  of  it,  I  think,  it  being  at 
least  a  forty -to-one  shot  that  Rupert,  the  boy  scout, 
is  talking  high  and  wide.  And  I  drop  into  the  Crimes 
again  at  a  good,  murderous  place  with  stilettos. 

"I  can't  tell  even  now  how  it  happened.  All  I 
know  is  that  it  was  two  o'clock,  and  all  at  once  it  was 
five-thirty  p.  M.  by  a  fussy  gold  clock  over  on  the 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  113 

mantel  with  a  gold  young  lady,  wearing  a  spear, 
standing  on  top  of  it.  I  woke  up  without  ever  sus- 
picioning  that  I'd  been  asleep.  Anyway,  I  think  I'm 
feeling  better,  and  I  stretch,  though  careful,  account 
of  the  dame  in  the  plush  bonnet  with  forget-me-nots; 
and  I  lie  there  thinking  mebbe  I'll  enter  the  ring 
again  to-morrow  for  some  other  truck  I  was  needing, 
and  thinking  how  quiet  and  peaceful  it  is — how  awful 
quiet!  I  got  it  then,  all  right.  That  quiet!  If 
you'd  known  little  Margery  better  you'd  know  how 
sick  that  quiet  made  me  all  at  once.  My  gizzard 
or  something  turned  clean  over. 

"I  let  out  a  yell  for  them  kids  right  where  I  lay. 
Then  I  bounded  to  my  feet  and  run  through  the 
rooms  downstairs  yelling.  No  sign  of  'em !  And  out 
into  the  kitchen — and  here  was  Tillie,  the  maid,  and 
Yetta,  the  cook,  both  saying  it's  queer,  but  they 
ain't  heard  a  sound  of  'em  either,  for  near  an  hour. 
So  I  yelled  out  back  to  an  old  hick  of  a  gardener  that's 
deef,  and  he  comes  running;  but  he  don't  know  a 
thing  on  earth  about  the  kids  or  anything  else.  Then 
I  am  sick !  I  send  Tillie  one  way  along  the  street  and 
the  gardener  the  other  way  to  find  out  if  any  neigh 
bours  had  seen  'em.  Then  in  a  minute  this  here  Yetta, 
the  cook,  says :  *  Why,  now,  Miss  Margery  was  saying 
she'd  go  downtown  to  buy  some  candy,'  and  Yetta 
says:  'You  know,  Miss  Margery,  your  mother  never 
lets  you  have  candy.'  And  Margery  says:  'Well, 
she  might  change  her  mind  any  minute — you  can't 
tell;  and  it's  best  to  have  some  on  hand  in  case  she 


114          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

does.'  And  she'd  got  some  poker  chips  out  of  the  box 
to  buy  the  candy  with — five  blue  chips  she  had, 
knowing  they  was  nearly  money  anyway. 

"And  when  Yetta  seen  it  was  only  poker  chips  she 
knew  the  kid  couldn't  buy  candy  with  'em — not  even 
in  Yonkers;  so  she  didn't  think  any  more  about  it 
until  it  come  over  her — just  like  that — how  quiet 
everything  was.  Oh,  that  Yetta  would  certainly  be 
found  bone  clear  to  the  centre  if  her  skull  was  ever 
drilled — the  same  stuff  they  slaughter  the  poor  ele 
phants  for  over  in  Africa — going  so  far  away,  with 
Yetta  right  there  to  their  hands,  as  you  might  say. 
And  I'm  getting  Dicker  and  sicker!  I'd  have  re 
tained  my  calm  mind,  mind  you,  if  they  had  been  my 
own  kids — but  kids  of  others  I'd  been  sacredly  trusted 
with! 

"And  then  down  the  back  stairs  comes  this  here 
sandy-complected,  horse-faced  plumber  that  had 
been  frittering  away  his  time  all  day  up  in  a  bathroom 
over  one  little  leak,  and  looking  as  sad  and  mournful 
as  if  he  hadn't  just  won  eight  dollars,  or  whatever  it 
was.  He  must  have  been  born  that  way — not  even 
being  a  plumber  had  cheered  him  up. 

" ' Blackhanders ! 'he  says  right  off, kind  of  brighten 
ing  a  little  bit. 

"I  like  to  fainted  for  fair!  He  says  they  had  lured 
the  kids  off  with  candy  and  popcorn,  and  would  hold 
'em  in  a  tenement  house  for  ten  thousand  dollars,  to 
be  left  on  a  certain  spot  at  twelve  P.  M.  He  seemed 
to  know  a  lot  about  their  ways. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  115 

"'They  got  the  Honourable  Simon  T.  Griff  en- 
baugh's  youngest  that  way,'  he  says,  'only  a  month 
ago.  Likely  the  same  gang  got  these  two/ 

"'How  do  you  know?'  I  asks  him. 

"'Well,'  he  says,  'they's  a  gang  of  over  two  hun 
dred  of  these  I-talian  Blackhanders  working  right 
now  on  a  sewer  job  something  about  two  miles  up  the 
road.  That's  how  I  know,'  he  says.  'That's  plain 
enough,  ain't  it?  It's  as  plain  as  the  back  of  my 
hand.  What  chance  would  them  two  defenceless 
little  children  have  with  a  gang  of  two  hundred 
Blackhanders?' 

"  But  that  looked  foolish,  even  to  me.  *  Shucks ! '  I 
says.  'That  don't  stand  to  reason.'  But  then  I  got 
another  scare.  'How  about  water?'  I  says.  'Any 
places  round  here  they  could  fall  into  and  get 
drownded?' 

"He'd  looked  glum  again  when  I  said  two  hundred 
Blackhanders  didn't  sound  reasonable;  but  he  cheers 
up  at  this  and  says:  'Oh,  yes;  lots  of  places  they  could 
drownd — cricks  and  rivers  and  lakes  and  ponds  and 
tanks — any  number  of  places  they  could  fall  into  and 
never  come  up  again.'  Say,  he  made  that  whole 
neighbourhood  sound  like  Venice,  Italy.  You  won 
dered  how  folks  ever  got  round  without  gondolas  or 
something.  'One  of  Dr.  George  F.  Maybury's  two 
kids  was  nearly  drownded  last  Tuesday — only  the 
older  one  saved  him;  a  wonder  it  was  they  didn't  have 
to  drag  tjie  river  and  find  'em  on  the  bottom  locked  in 
each  other's  arms!  And  a  boy  by  the  name  of 


116  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Clifford  Something,  only  the  other  day,  playing  down 
by  the  railroad  tracks ' 

"I  shut  him  off,  you  bet!  I  told  him  to  get  out 
quick  and  go  to  his  home  if  he  had  one. 

"I  certainly  hope  I  won't  have  to  read  anything 
horrible  in  to-morrow's  paper!'  he  says  as  he  goes 
down  the  back  stoop.  'Only  last  week  they  was  a 
nigger  caught ' 

"  I  shut  the  door  on  him.  Rattled  good  and  plenty 
I  was  by  then.  Back  comes  this  silly  old  gardener — 
he'd  gone  with  his  hoe  and  was  still  gripping  it.  The 
neighbours  down  that  way  hadn't  seen  the  kids. 
Back  comes  Tillie.  One  neighbour  where  she'd  been 
had  seen  'em  climb  on  to  a  street  car — only  it  wasn't 
going  downtown  but  into  the  country;  and  this 
neighbour  had  said  to  herself  that  the  boy  would  be 
likely  to  let  some  one  have  it  in  the  eye  with  his  gun, 
the  careless  way  he  was  lugging  it. 

"Thank  the  Lord,  that  was  a  trace!  I  telephoned 
to  the  police  and  told  'em  all  about  it.  And  I  tele 
phoned  for  a  motor  car  for  me  and  got  into  some 
clothes.  Good  and  scared — yes!  I  caught  sight  of 
my  face  in  the  looking-glass,  and,  my!  but  it  was 
pasty — it  looked  like  one  of  these  cheap  apple  pies 
you  see  in  the  window  of  a  two-bit  lunch  place !  And 
while  I'm  waiting  for  this  motor  car,  what  should 
come  but  a  telegram  from  Mr.  W.  B.  himself  saying 
that  the  aunt  was  worse  and  he  would  go  to  New 
Jersey  himself  for  the  night!  Some  said  this  aunt 
was  worth  a  good  deal  more  than  she  was  supposed  to 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  117 

be.  And  I  not  knowing  the  name  of  this  town  in 
Jersey  where  they  would  all  be! — it  was  East  Some 
thing  or  West  Something,  and  hard  to  remember,  and 
I'd  forgot  it. 

"I  called  the  police  again  and  they  said  descrip 
tions  was  being  sent  out,  and  that  probably  I'd  better 
not  worry,  because  they  often  had  cases  like  this. 
And  I  offered  to  bet  them  they  hadn't  a  case  since 
Yonkers  was  first  thought  of  that  had  meant  so  much 
spot  cash  to  'em  as  this  one  would  mean  the  minute 
I  got  a  good  grip  on  them  kids.  So  this  cop  said 
mebbe  they  had  better  worry  a  little,  after  all,  and 
they'd  send  out  two  cars  of  their  own  and  scour  the 
country,  and  try  to  find  the  conductor  of  this  street 
car  that  the  neighbour  woman  had  seen  the  kids  get 
on  to. 

"I  r'ared  round  that  house  till  the  auto  come  that 
I'd  ordered.  It  was  late  coming,  naturally,  and 
nearly  dark  when  it  got  there;  but  we  covered  a  lot  of 
miles  while  the  daylight  lasted,  with  the  man  look 
ing  sharp  out  along  the  road,  too,  because  he  had 
three  kids  of  his  own  that  would  do  any  living  thing 
sometimes,  though  safe  at  home  and  asleep  at  that 
minute,  thank  God! 

"It  was  moisting  when  we  started,  and  pretty  soon 
it  clouded  up  and  the  dark  came  on,  and  I  felt  beat. 
We  got  fair  locoed.  We'd  go  down  one  road  and 
then  back  the  same  way.  We  stopped  to  ask  every 
body.  Then  we  found  the  two  autos  sent  out  by  the 
police.  I  told  the  cops  again  what  would  happen  to 


118          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED.  GAP 

'em  from  me  the  minute  the  kids  was  found — the  kids 
or  their  bodies.  I  was  so  despairing — what  with  that 
damned  plumber  and  every  thing!  L'll  bet  he's  the 
merry  chatterbox  in  his  own  home.  The  police  said 
cheer  up — nothing  like  that,  with  the  country  as 
safe  as  a  church.  But  we  went  over  to  this  Black- 
handers'  construction  camp,  just  the  same,  to  make 
sure,  and  none  of  the  men  was  missing,  the  boss  said, 
and  no  children  had  been  seen;  and  anyway  his  men 
was  ordinary  decent  wops  and  not  Blackhanders — 
and  blamed  if  about  fifty  of  'em  didn't  turn  out  to 
help  look!  Yes,  sir,  there  they  was — foreigners  to 
the  last  man  except  the  boss,  who  was  Irish — and 
acting  just  like  human  beings. 

"It  was  near  ten  o'clock  now;  so  we  went  to  a 
country  saloon  to  telephone  police  headquarters,  and 
they  had  found  the  car  conductor,  he  remembering 
because  he  had  threatened  to  put  the  boy  scout  off  the 
car  if  he  didn't  quit  pointing  his  gun  straight  at  an  old 
man  with  gold  spectacles  setting  across  the  aisle. 
And  finally  they  had  got  off  themselves  about  three 
miles  down  the  road;  he'd  watched  'em  climb  over  a 
stone  wall  and  start  up  a  hill  into  some  woods  that 
was  there.  And  he  was  Conductor  Number  Twenty- 
seven,  if  we  wanted  to  know  that. 

"We  beat  it  to  that  spot  after  I'd  powdered  my 
nose  and  we'd  had  a  quick  round  of  drinks.  The  po 
licemen  knew  where  it  was.  It  wasn't  moisting  any 
more — it  was  raining  for  fair;  and  we  done  some 
ground-and-lofty  skidding  before  we  got  there.  We 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  119 

found  the  stone  wall  all  right  and  the  slope  leading  up 
to  the  woods;  but,  my  Lord,  there  was  a  good  half 
mile  of  it!  We  strung  out — four  cops  and  my  driver 
and  me — hundreds  of  yards  apart  and  all  yelling,  so 
maybe  the  poor  lost  things  would  hear  us. 

"We  made  up  to  the  woods  without  raising  a  sign; 
and,  my  lands,  wasn't  it  dark  inside  the  woods!  I 
worked  forward,  trying  to  keep  straight  from  tree  to 
tree;  but  I  stumbled  and  tore  my  clothes  and  sprained 
my  wrist,  and  blacked  one  eye  the  prettiest  you'd 
want  to  see — mighty  near  being  a  blubberhead  my 
self,  I  was — it  not  being  my  kids,  you  understand. 
Oh,  I  kept  to  it  though!  I'd  have  gone  straight  up 
the  grand  old  state  of  New  York  into  Lake  Erie  if 
something  hadn't  stopped  me. 

"  It  was  a  light  off  through  the  pine  and  oak  trees, 
and  down  in  a  kind  of  little  draw — not  a  lamplight 
but  a  fire  blazing  up.  I  yelled  to  both  sides  toward 
the  others.  I  can  yell  good  when  I'm  put  to  it. 
Then  I  started  for  the  light.  I  could  make  out 
figures  round  the  fire.  Mebbe  it's  a  Blackhanders' 
camp,  I  think;  so  I  didn't  yell  any  more.  I  cat- 
footed.  And  in  a  minute  I  was  up  close  and  seen  'em 
— there  in  the  dripping  rain. 

"Rupert,  Junior,  was  asleep,  leaned  setting  up 
against  a  tree,  with  a  messenger  boy's  cap  on.  And 
Margery  was  asleep  on  a  pile  of  leaves,  with  her 
cheek  on  one  hand  and  something  over  her.  And  a 
fat  man  was  asleep  on  his  back,  with  his  mouth  open, 
making  an  awful  fuss  about  it.  And  the  only  one 


120          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

that  wasn't  asleep  was  a  funny  little  old  man  setting 
against  another  tree.  He  had  on  the  scout's  cam 
paign  hat  and  he  held  the  gun  across  his  chest  in  the 
crook  of  his  arm.  He  hadn't  any  coat  on.  Then 
I  see  his  coat  was  what  was  over  Margery;  and 
I  looked  closer  and  it  was  a  messenger  boy's 
coat. 

"I  was  more  floored  than  ever  when  I  took  that  in. 
I  made  a  little  move,  and  this  funny  old  man  must 
have  heard  me — he  looked  like  one  of  them  silly  little 
critters  that  play  hob  with  Rip  Van  Winkle  out  on 
the  mountain  before  he  goes  to  sleep.  And  he  cocks 
his  ears  this  way  and  that;  then  he  jumped  to  his  feet, 
and  I  come  forward  where  he  could  see  me.  And 
darned  if  he  didn't  up  with  this  here  air  gun  of  Ru 
pert's,  like  a  flash,  and  plunk  me  with  a  buckshot  it 
carried — right  on  my  sprained  wrist,  too! 

"Say,  I  let  out  a  yell,  and  I  had  him  by  the  neck 
of  his  shirt  in  one  grab.  I  was  still  shaking  him  when 
the  others  come  to.  The  fat  man  set  up  and  rubbed 
his  eyes  and  blinked.  That's  all  he  done.  Rupert 
woke  up  the  same  minute  and  begun  to  cry  like  a 
baby;  and  Margery  woke  up,  but  she  didn't  cry.  She 
took  a  good  look  at  me  and  she  says:  'You  let  him 
alone!  He's  my  knight — he  slays  all  the  dragons. 
He's  a  good  knight!' 

"There  I  was,  still  shaking  the  little  old  man — I'd 
forgot  all  about  him.  So  I  dropped  him  on  the 
ground  and  reached  for  Margery;  and  I  was  so  afraid 
I  was  going  to  blubber  like  Rupert,  the  scout,  that  I 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

let  out  some  words  to  keep  from  it.     Yes,  sir;  I  admit 
it. 

"'Oh!  Oh!  Oh!  Swearing!'  says  Rupert.  I 
shall  tell  mother  and  Aunt  Hilda  just  what  you  said ! ' 

"Mebby  you  can  get  Rupert's  number  from  that. 
I  did  anyway.  I  stood  up  from  Margery  and  cuffed 
him.  He  went  on  sobbing,  but  not  without  reason. 

"'Margery  Hemingway/  I  says,  'how  dare  you!' 
And  she  looks  up  all  cool  and  cunning,  and  says: 
'  Ho !  I  bet  I  know  worse  words  than  what  you  said ! 
See  if  I  don't.'  So  then  I  shut  her  off  mighty  quick. 
But  still  she  didn't  cry.  'I  s'pose  I  must  go  back 
home,'  she  says.  'And  perhaps  it  is  all  for  the  best. 
I  have  a  very  beautiful  home.  Perhaps  I  should  stay 
there  oftener.' 

"I  turned  on  the  Blackhanders. 

'"Did  these  brutes  entice  you  away  with  candy?' 
I  demanded.  'Was  they  holding  you  here  for  ran 
som?' 

"'Huh!  I  should  think  not!'  she  says.  'They 
are  a  couple  of  'f raid-cats.  They  were  afraid  as  any 
thing  when  we  all  got  lost  in  these  woods  and  wanted 
to  keep  on  finding  our  way  out.  And  I  said  I  bet 
they  were  awful  cowards,  and  the  fat  one  said  of 
course  he  was;  but  this  old  one  became  very,  very  in 
dignant  and  said  he  bet  he  wasn't  any  more  of  a 
coward  than  I  am,  but  we  simply  ought  to  go  where 
there  were  more  houses.  And  so  I  consented  and  we 
got  lost  worse  than  ever — about  a  hundred  miles,  I 
think — in  this  dense  forest  and  we  couldn't  return  to 


122          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

our  beautiful  homes.  And  this  one  said  he  was  a 
trapper,  scout,  and  guide;  so  he  built  this  lovely  fire 
and  I  ate  a  lot  of  crullers  the  silly  things  had  brought 
with  them.  And  then  this  old  one  flung  his  robe  over 
me  because  I  was  a  princess,  and  it  made  me  invisible 
to  prowling  wolves;  and  anyway  he  sat  up  to  shoot 
them  with  his  deadly  rifle  that  he  took  away  from 
Cousin  Rupert.  And  Cousin  Rupert  became  very 
tearful  indeed;  so  we  took  his  hat  away,  too,  because 
it's  a  truly  scout  hat.' 

"'And  she  smoked  a  cigarette,'  says  Rupert,  still 
sobbing. 

"'He  smoked  one,  too,  and  I  mean  to  tell  his 
mother,'  says  Margery.  'It's  something  I  think  she 
ought  to  know.' 

"'It  made  me  sick,'  says  Rupert.  'It  was  a 
poison  cigarette;  I  nearly  died.' 

" '  Mine  never  made  me  sick,'  says  Margery — 'only 
it  was  kind  of  sting-y  to  the  tongue  and  I  swallowed 
smoke  through  my  nose  repeatedly.  And  first,  this 
old  one  wouldn't  give  us  the  cigarettes  at  all,  until 
I  threatened  to  cast  a  spell  on  him  and  turn  him  into 
a  toad  forever.  I  never  did  that  to  any  one,  but  I  bet 
I  could.  And  the  fat  one  cried  like  anything  and 
begged  me  not  to  turn  the  old  one  into  a  toad,  and  the 
old  one  said  he  didn't  think  I  could  in  a  thousand 
years,  but  he  wouldn't  take  any  chances  in  the  Far 
West;  so  he  gave  us  the  cigarettes,  and  Rupert  only 
smoked  half  of  his  and  then  he  acted  in  a  very  com 
mon  way,  I  must  say.  And  this  old  one  said  we 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  123 

would  have  br'iled  b'ar  steaks  for  breakfast.  What 
is  a  br'iled  b'ar  steak?  I'm  hungry.' 

"Such  was  little  angel-faced  Margery.  Does  she 
promise  to  make  life  interesting  for  those  who  love 
her,  or  does  she  not? 

"Well,  that's  all.  Of  course  these  cops  when  they 
come  up  said  the  two  men  was  desperate  crooks 
wanted  in  every  state  in  the  Union;  but  I  swore  I 
knew  them  both  well  and  they  was  harmless;  and  I 
made  it  right  with  'em  about  the  reward  as  soon  as 
I  got  back  to  a  check  book.  After  that  they'd  have 
believed  anything  I  said.  And  I  sent  something  over 
to  the  Blackhanders  that  had  turned  out  to  help  look, 
and  something  to  Conductor  Number  Twenty-seven. 
And  the  next  day  I  squared  myself  with  Mrs.  W.  B. 
Hemingway  and  her  husband,  and  Mrs.  L.  H.  Cum 
mins,  when  they  come  back,  the  aunt  not  having  been 
sick  but  only  eccentric  again. 

"And  them  two  poor  homeless  boys — they  kind  of 
got  me,  I  admit,  after  I'd  questioned  'em  awhile.  So 
I  coaxed  'em  out  here  where  they  could  lead  the  wild, 
free  life.  Kind  of  sad  and  pathetic,  almost,  they 
was.  The  fat  one  I  found  was  just  a  kind  of  natural- 
born  one — a  feeb  you  understand — and  the  old  one 
had  a  scar  that  the  doctor  said  explained  him  all  right 
— you  must  have  noticed  it  up  over  his  temple.  It's 
where  his  old  man  laid  him  out  once,  when  he  was  a 
kid,  with  a  stovelifter.  It  seemed  to  stop  his  works. 

"Yes;  they're  pretty  good  boys.  Boogies  was 
never  bad  but  once,  account  of  two  custard  pies  off 


124  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

the  kitchen  window  sill.  I  threatened  him  with  his 
stepmother  and  he  hid  under  the  house  for  twenty- 
four  hours.  The  other  one  is  pretty  good,  too.  This 
is  only  the  second  time  I  had  to  punish  him  for  fooling 
with  live  ca'tridges.  There !  It's  sundown  and  he's 
got  on  his  Wild  Wests  again." 

Jimmie  Time  swaggered  from  the  bunk  house  in  his 
fearsome  regalia.  Under  the  awed  observation  of 
Boogies  he  wheeled,  drew,  and  shot  from  the  hip  one 
who  had  cravenly  sought  to  attack  him  from  the  rear. 

"My,  but  he's  hostile!"  murmured  my  hostess. 
"Ain't  he  just  the  hostile  little  wretch?" 


IV 
ONCE  A  SCOTCHMAN,  ALWAYS 

TERRIFIC  sound  waves  beat  upon  the  Ar 
rowhead  ranch  house  this  night.  At  five 
o'clock  a  hundred  and  twenty  Hereford 
calves  had  been  torn  from  their  anguished  mothers 
for  the  first  time  and  shut  into  a  too  adjacent  feeding 
pen.  Mothers  and  offspring,  kept  a  hundred  yards 
apart  by  two  stout  fences,  unceasingly  bawled  their 
grief,  a  noble  chorus  of  yearning  and  despair.  The 
calves  projected  a  high,  full-throated  barytone,  with 
here  and  there  a  wailing  tenor  against  the  rumbling 
bass  of  their  dams.  And  ever  and  again  pealed  dis 
tantly  into  the  chorus  the  flute  obbligato  of  an  emo 
tional  coyote  down  on  the  flat.  There  was  never  a 
diminuendo.  The  fortissimo  had  been  steadily  main 
tained  for  three  hours  and  would  endure  the  night 
long,  perhaps  for  two  other  nights. 

At  eight  o'clock  I  sleepily  wondered  how  I  should 
sleep.  And  thus  wondering,  I  marvelled  at  the  in 
difference  to  the  racket  of  my  hostess,  Mrs.  Lysander 
John  Pettengill.  Through  dinner  and  now  as  she 
read  a  San  Francisco  newspaper  she  had  betrayed  no 
consciousness  of  it.  She  read  her  paper  and  from 
time  to  time  she  chuckled. 

125 


126  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"How  do  you  like  it? "  I  demanded,  referring  to  the 
monstrous  din. 

"It's  great,"  she  said,  plainly  referring  to  some 
thing  else.  "One  of  them  real  upty-up  weddings  in 
high  life,  with  orchestras  and  bowers  of  orchids  and 
the  bride  a  vision  of  loveliness " 

"I  mean  the  noise." 

"What  noise?"  She  put  the  paper  aside  and 
stared  at  me,  listening  intently.  I  saw  that  she  was 
honestly  puzzled,  even  as  the  chorus  swelled  to  un 
believable  volume.  I  merely  waved  a  hand.  The 
coyote  was  then  doing  a  most  difficult  tremolo  high 
above  the  clamour. 

"Oh,  that ! "  said  my  enlightened  hostess.  "That's 
nothing;  just  a  little  bunch  of  calves  being  weaned. 
We  never  notice  that — and  say,  they  got  the  groom's 
mother  in  here,  too.  Yes,  sir,  Ellabelle  in  all  her 
tiaras  and  sunbursts  and  dog  collars  and  diamond 
chest  protectors — Mrs.  Angus  McDonald,  mother  of 
groom,  in  a  stunning  creation!  I  bet  they  didn't 
need  any  flashlight  when  they  took  her,  not  with  them 
stones  all  over  her  person.  They  could  have  took  her 
in  a  coal  cellar." 

"How  do  you  expect  to  sleep  with  all  that  going 
on?"  I  insisted. 

"All  what?  Oh,  them  calves.  That's  nothing! 
Angus  says  to  her  when  they  first  got  money: 
'Whatever  you  economize  in,  let  it  not  be  in  dia 
monds!'  He  says  nothing  looks  so  poverty-stricken 
as  a  person  that  can  only  afford  a  few.  Better  wear 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  127 

none  at  all  than  just  a  mere  handful,  he  says.  What 
do  you  think  of  that  talk  from  a  man  named  Angus 
McDonald?  You'd  think  a  Scotchman  and  his 
money  was  soon  parted,  but  I  heard  him  say  it  from 
the  heart  out.  And  yet  Ellabelle  never  does  seem 
to  get  him.  Only  a  year  ago,  when  I  was  at  this 
here  rich  place  down  from  San  Francisco  where  they 
got  the  new  marble  palace,  there  was  a  lovely  blow 
up  and  Ellabelle  says  to  me  in  her  hysteria:  'Once  a 
Scotchman,  always  a  Scotchman!'  Oh,  she  was 
hysteric  all  right!  She  was  like  what  I  seen  about 
one  of  the  movie  actresses,  'the  empress  of  stormy 
emotion/  Of  course  she  feels  better  now,  after  the 
wedding  and  all  this  newspaper  guff.  And  it  was  a 
funny  blow-up.  I  don't  know  as  I  blamed  her  at  the 
time." 

I  now  closed  a  window  and  a  door  upon  the  noisy 
September  night.  It  helped  a  little.  I  went  back  to 
a  chair  nearer  to  this  woman  with  ears  trained  in  re 
jection.  That  helped  more.  I  could  hear  her  now, 
save  in  the  more  passionate  intervals  of  the  chorus. 

"All  right,  then.  What  was  the  funny  blow-up?" 
She  caught  the  significance  of  the  closed  door  and 
window. 

"But  that's  music,"  she  insisted.  "Why,  I'd  like 
to  have  a  good  record  of  about  two  hundred  of  them 
white-faced  beauties  being  weaned,  so  I  could  play 
it  on  a  phonograph  when  I'm  off  visiting — only  it 
would  make  me  too  homesick."  She  glanced  at  the 
closed  door  and  window  in  a  way  that  I  found  sinister. 


128  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"I  couldn't  hear  you,"  I  suggested. 

"Oh,  all  right!"  She  listened  wistfully  a  moment 
to  the  now  slightly  dulled  oratorio,  then:  "Yes, 
Angus  McDonald  is  his  name;  but  there  are  two  kinds 
of  Scotch,  and  Angus  is  the  other  kind.  Of  course 
he's  one  of  the  big  millionaires  now,  with  money 
enough  to  blind  any  kind  of  a  Scotchman,  but  he  was 
the  other  kind  even  when  he  first  come  out  to  us,  a 
good  thirty  years  ago,  without  a  cent.  He's  a  kind 
of  second  or  third  cousin  of  mine  by  marriage  or 
something — I  never  could  quite  work  it  out — and 
he'd  learned  his  trade  back  in  Ohio;  but  he  felt  that 
the  East  didn't  have  any  future  to  speak  of,  so  he 
decided  to  come  West.  He  was  a  painter  and  grainer 
and  kalsominer  and  paperhanger,  that  kind  of  thing 
— a  good,  quiet  boy  about  twenty-five,  not  saying 
much,  chunky  and  slow-moving  but  sure,  with  a 
round  Scotch  head  and  a  snub  nose,  and  one  heavy 
eyebrow  that  run  clean  across  his  face — not  cut  in 
two  like  most  are. 

"He  landed  on  the  ranch  and  slowly  looked  things 
over  and  let  on  after  a  few  days  that  he  mebbe  would 
be  a  cowboy  on  account  of  it  taking  him  outdoors 
more  than  kalsomining  would.  Lysander  John  was 
pretty  busy,  but  he  said  all  right,  and  gave  him  a 
saddle  and  bridle  and  a  pair  of  bull  pants  and  warned 
him  about  a  couple  of  cinch-binders  that  he  mustn't 
try  to  ride  or  they  would  murder  him.  And  so  one 
morning  Angus  asked  a  little  bronch-squeezer  we 
had,  named  Everett  Sloan,  to  pick  him  out  something 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  129 

safe  to  ride,  and  Everett  done  so.  Brought  him  up 
a  nice  old  rope  horse  that  would  have  been  as  safe  as 
a  supreme-court  judge,  but  the  canny  Angus  says: 
( No,  none  of  your  tricks  now!  That  beast  has  the 
very  devil  in  his  eye,  and  you  wish  to  sit  by  and 
laugh  your  fool  head  off  when  he  displaces  me.' 
'Is  that  so?'  says  Everett.  'I  suspect  you,'  says 
Angus.  'I've  read  plentifully  about  the  tricks  of 
you  cowlads.'  'Pick  your  own  horse,  then,'  says 
Everett.  'I'd  better,'  says  Angus,  and  picks  one 
over  by  the  corral  gate  that  was  asleep  standing  up, 
with  a  wisp  of  hay  hanging  out  of  his  mouth  like 
he'd  been  too  tired  to  finish  eating  it.  'This  steed 
is  more  to  my  eye,'  says  Angus.  'He's  old  and 
withered  and  he  has  no  evil  ambitions.  But  maybe 
I  can  wake  him  up.'  'Maybe  you  can,'  says  Everett, 
'but  are  you  dead  sure  you  want  to?'  Angus 
was  dead  sure.  '  I  shall  thwart  your  murderous  de 
sign,'  says  he.  So  Everett  with  a  stung  look  helped 
him  saddle  this  one.  He  had  his  alibi  all  right,  and 
besides,  nothing  ever  did  worry  that  buckaroo  as 
long  as  his  fingers  wasn't  too  cold  to  roll  a  ciga 
rette. 

"The  beast  was  still  asleep  when  Angus  forked 
him.  Without  seeming  to  wake  up  much  he  at  once 
traded  ends,  poured  Angus  out  of  the  saddle,  and 
stacked  him  up  in  some  mud  that  was  providentially 
there — mud  soft  enough  to  mire  your  shadow.  An 
gus  got  promptly  up,  landed  a  strong  kick  in  the  ribs 
of  the  outlaw  which  had  gone  to  sleep  again  before  he 


130  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

lit,  shook  hands  warmly  with  Everett  and  says: 
'What  does  a  man  need  with  two  trades  anyway? 
Good-bye ! ' 

"But  when  Lysander  John  hears  about  it  he  says 
Angus  has  just  the  right  stuff  in  him  for  a  cowman. 
He  says  he  has  never  known  one  yet  that  you  could 
tell  anything  to  before  he  found  it  out  for  himself, 
and  Angus  must  sure  have  the  makings  of  a  good  one, 
so  he  persuades  him  to  stay  round  for  a  while,  work 
ing  at  easy  jobs  that  couldn't  stack  him  up,  and  later 
he  sent  him  to  Omaha  with  the  bunch  in  charge  of  a 
trainload  of  steers. 

"The  trip  back  was  when  his  romance  begun. 
Angus  had  kept  fancy-free  up  to  that  time,  being 
willing  enough  but  thoroughly  cautious.  Do  you 
remember  the  eating-house  at  North  Platte,  Ne 
braska?  The  night  train  from  Omaha  would  reach 
there  at  breakfast  time  and  you'd  get  out  in  the 
frosty  air,  hungry  as  a  confirmed  dyspeptic,  and  rush 
into  the  big  red  building  past  the  man  that  was 
rapidly  beating  on  a  gong  with  one  of  these  soft- 
ended  bass-drum  sticks.  My,  the  good  hot  smells 
inside!  Tables  already  loaded  with  ham  and  eggs 
and  fried  oysters  and  fried  chicken  and  sausage  and 
fried  potatoes  and  steaks  and  hot  biscuits  and  corn 
bread  and  hot  cakes  and  regular  coffee — till  you  didn't 
know  which  to  begin  on,  and  first  thing  you  knew  you 
had  your  plate  loaded  with  too  many  things — but 
how  you  did  eat! — and  yes,  thank  you,  another  cup  of 
coffee,  and  please  pass  the  sirup  this  way.  And  no 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  131 

worry  about  the  train  pulling  out,  because  there  the 
conductor  is  at  that  other  table  and  it  can't  go  with 
out  him,  so  take  your  time — and  about  three  more  of 
them  big  fried  oysters,  the  only  good  fried  ones  I  ever 
had  in  the  world !  To  this  day  I  get  hungry  thinking 
of  that  North  Platte  breakfast,  and  mad  when  I  go 
into  the  dining-car  as  we  pass  there  and  try  to  get  the 
languid  mulatto  to  show  a  little  enthusiasm. 

"Well,  they  had  girls  at  that  eating-house.  Of 
course  no  one  ever  noticed  'em  much,  being  too 
famished  and  busy.  You  only  knew  in  a  general 
way  that  females  was  passing  the  food  along.  But 
Angus  actually  did  notice  Ellabelle,  though  it  must 
have  been  at  the  end  of  the  meal,  mebbe  when  she 
was  pouring  the  third  cup.  Ellabelle  was  never 
right  pretty  to  my  notion,  but  she  had  some  figure 
and  kind  of  a  sad  dignity,  and  her  brown  hair  lacked 
the  towers  and  minarets  and  golden  domes  that  the 
other  girls  built  with  their  own  or  theirs  by  right  of 
purchase.  And  she  seems  to  have  noticed  Angus 
from  the  very  first.  Angus  saw  that  when  she  wasn't 
passing  the  fried  chicken  or  the  hot  biscuits  along, 
even  for  half  a  minute,  she'd  pick  up  a  book  from  the 
window  sill  and  glance  studiously  at  its  pages.  He 
saw  the  book  was  called  'Lucile.'  And  he  looked  her 
over  some  more — between  mouthfuls,  of  course — the 
neat-fitting  black  dress  revealing  every  line  of  her 
lithe  young  figure,  like  these  magazine  stories  say, 
the  starched  white  apron  and  the  look  of  sad  dignity 
that  had  probably  come  of  fresh  drummers  trying 


132          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

to  teach  her  how  to  take  a  joke,  and  the  smooth 
brown  hair — he'd  probably  got  wise  to  the  other 
kind  back  in  the  social  centres  of  Ohio — and  all  at 
once  he  saw  there  was  something  about  her.  He 
couldn't  tell  what  it  was,  but  he  knew  it  was  there. 
He  heard  one  of  the  over-haired  ones  call  her  Ellabelle, 
and  he  committed  the  name  to  memory. 

"He  also  remembered  the  book  she  was  reading. 
He  come  back  with  a  copy  he'd  bought  at  Spokane 
and  kept  it  on  his  bureau.  Not  that  he  read  it 
much.  It  was  :  harder  to  get  into  than  *  Peck's 
Bad  Boy,'  which  was  his  favourite  reading  just 
then. 

"Pretty  soon  another  load  of  steers  is  ready — my 
sakes,  what  scrubby  runts  we  sent  off  the  range  in 
them  days  compared  to  now! — and  Angus  pleads  to 
go,  so  Lysander  John  makes  a  place  for  him  and,  com 
ing  back,  here's  Ellabelle  handing  the  hot  things 
along  same  as  ever,  with  'Lucile'  at  hand  for  idle 
moments.  This  time  Angus  again  made  certain 
there  was  something  about  her.  He  cross-examined 
her,  I  suppose,  between  the  last  ham  and  eggs  and 
the  first  hot  cakes.  Her  folks  was  corn  farmers  over 
in  Iowa  and  she'd  gone  to  high  school  and  had  meant 
to  be  a  teacher,  but  took  this  job  because  with  her  it 
was  anything  to  get  out  of  Iowa,  which  she  spoke  of 
in  a  warm,  harsh  way. 

"Angus  nearly  lost  the  train  that  time,  making 
certain  there  was  something  about  her.  He  told 
her  to  be  sure  and  stay  there  till  he  showed  up  again. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  133 

He  told  me  about  her  when  he  got  back.  'There's 
something  about  her,'  he  says.  'I  suspect  it's  her 
eyes,  though  it  might  be  something  else.' 

"Me?  I  suspected  there  was  something  about  her, 
too;  only  I  thought  it  was  just  that  North  Platte 
breakfast  and  his  appetite.  No  meal  can  ever  be 
like  breakfast  to  them  that's  two-fisted,  and  Angus 
was.  He'd  think  there  was  something  about  any 
girl,  I  says  to  myself,  seeing  her  through  the  romantic 
golden  haze  of  them  North  Platte  breakfast  victuals. 
Of  course  I  didn't  suggest  any  such  base  notion  to 
Angus,  knowing  how  little  good  it  does  to  talk  sense 
to  a  man  when  he  thinks  there's  something  about  a 
girl.  He  tried  to  read  'Lucile'  again,  but  couldn't 
seem  to  strike  any  funny  parts. 

"Next  time  he  went  to  Omaha,  a  month  later,  he 
took  his  other  suit  and  his  new  boots.  'I  shall  fling 
caution  to  the  winds  and  seal  my  fate/  he  says. 
'There's  something  about  her,  and  some  depraved 
scoundrel  might  find  it  out.'  'All  right,  go  ahead 
and  seal,'  I  says.  '  You  can't  expect  us  to  be  shipping 
steers  every  month  just  to  give  you  twenty  minutes 
with  a  North  Platte  waiter  girl.'  'Will  she  think  me 
impetuous?'  says  he.  'Better  that  than  have  her 
think  you  ain't,'  I  warns  him.  'Men  have  been 
turned  down  for  ten  million  reasons,  and  being  im 
petuous  is  about  the  only  one  that  was  never  num 
bered  among  them.  It  will  be  strange  o'clock  when 
that  happens.'  'She's  different,'  says  Angus.  'Of 
course,'  I  says.  'We're  all  different.  That's  what 


134  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

makes  us  so  much  alike.'  'You  might  know,'  says  he 
doubtfully. 

"He  proved  I  did,  on  the  trip  back.  He  marched 
up  to  Ellabelle's  end  of  the  table  in  his  other  suit  and 
his  new  boots  and  a  startling  necktie  he'd  bought  at  a 
place  near  the  stockyards  in  South  Omaha,  and  pro 
posed  honourable  marriage  to  her,  probably  after 
the  first  bite  of  sausage  and  while  she  was  setting  his 
coffee  down.  'And  youVe  only  twenty  minutes,'  he 
says,  'so  hurry  and  pack  your  grip.  We'll  be  wed 
when  we  get  off  the  train.'  'You're  too  impetuous/ 
says  Ellabelle,  looking  more  than  ever  as  if  there  was 
something  about  her.  'There,  I  was  afraid  I'd  be,' 
says  Angus,  quitting  on  some  steak  and  breaking 
out  into  scarlet  rash.  'What  did  you  think  I  am?' 
demands  Ellabelle.  'Did  you  think  I  would  answer 
your  beck  and  call  or  your  lightest  nod  as  if  I  were 
your  slave  or  something?  Little  you  know  me/  she 
says,  tossing  her  head  indignantly.  'I  apologize 
bitterly/  says  Angus.  'The  very  idea  is  monstrous/ 
says  she.  'Twenty  minutes — and  with  all  my 
packing!  You  will  wait  over  till  the  four-thirty-two 
this  afternoon/  she  goes  on,  very  stern  and  nervous, 
'or  all  is  over  between  us/  'I'll  wait  as  long  as  that 
for  you/  says  Angus,  going  to  the  steak  again.  'Are 
the  other  meals  here  as  good  as  breakfast? '  ' There's 
one  up  the  street/  says  Ellabelle;  'a  Presbyterian/ 
'I  would  prefer  a  Presbyterian/  says  Angus.  'Are 
those  fried  oysters  I  see  up  there?' 

"That  was  about  the  way  of  it,  I  gathered  later. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  135 

Anyway,  Angus  brought  her  back,  eating  on  the  way 
a  whole  wicker  suitcase  full  of  lunch  that  she  put  up. 
And  she  seemed  a  good,  capable  girl,  all  right.  She 
told  me  there  was  something  about  Angus.  She'd 
seen  that  from  the  first.  Even  so,  she  said,  she 
hadn't  let  him  sweep  her  off  her  feet  like  he  had 
meant  to,  but  had  forced  him  to  give  her  time  to  do 
her  packing  and  consider  the  grave  step  she  was 
taking  for  better  or  worse,  like  every  true,  serious- 
minded  woman  ought  to. 

"Angus  now  said  he  couldn't  afford  to  fritter  away 
any  more  time  in  the  cattle  business,  having  a  wife  to 
support  in  the  style  she  had  been  accustomed  to,  so 
he  would  go  to  work  at  his  trade.  He  picked  out 
Wallace,  just  over  in  Idaho,  as  a  young  and  growing 
town  where  he  could  do  well.  He  rented  a  nice 
four-room  cottage  there,  with  an  icebox  out  on  the 
back  porch  and  a  hammock  in  the  front  yard,  and 
begun  to  paper  and  paint  and  grain  and  kalsomine 
and  made  good  money  from  the  start.  Ellabelle  was 
a  crackajack  housekeeper  and  had  plenty  of  time  to 
lie  out  in  the  hammock  and  read  'Lucile'  of  afternoons. 

"By  and  by  Angus  had  some  money  saved  up, 
and  what  should  he  do  with  bits  of  it  now  and  then 
but  grubstake  old  Snowstorm  Hickey,  who'd  been 
scratching  mountainsides  all  his  life  and  never  found 
a  thing  and  likely  never  would — a  grouchy  old 
hardshell  with  white  hair  and  whiskers  whirling- 
about  his  head  in  such  quantities  that  a  body  just 
naturally  called  him  Snowstorm  without  thinking. 


136  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

It  made  him  highly  indignant,  but  he  never  would 
get  the  things  cut.  Well,  and  what  does  this  old 
snow-scene-in-the-Alps  do  after  about  a  year  but 
mush  along  up  the  canon  past  Mullan  and  find  a 
high-grade  proposition  so  rich  it  was  scandalous! 
They  didn't  know  how  rich  at  first,  of  course,  but 
Angus  got  assays  and  they  looked  so  good  they 
must  be  a  mistake,  so  they  sunk  a  shaft  and  drifted 
in  a  tunnel,  and  the  assays  got  better,  and  people 
with  money  was  pretty  soon  taking  notice. 

"One  day  Snowstorm  come  grouching  down  to 
Angus  and  tells  about  a  capitalist  that  had  brought 
two  experts  with  him  and  nosed  over  the  workings  for 
three  days.  Snowstorm  was  awful  dejected.  He 
had  hated  the  capitalist  right  off.  'He  wears  a  gold 
watch  chain  and  silk  underclothes  like  one  of  these 
fly  city  dames,'  says  Snowstorm,  who  was  a  knowing 
old  scoundrel,  'and  he  says  his  syndicate  on  the  re 
ports  of  these  two  thieving  experts  will  pay  twelve 
hundred  for  it  and  not  a  cent  more.  What  do  you 
think  of  that  for  nerve?' 

"'Is  that  all?'  says  Angus,  working  away  at  his 
job  in  the  new  International  Hotel  at  Wallace. 
Graining  a  door  in  the  dining-room  he  was,  with  a 
ham  rind  and  a  stocking  over  one  thumb  nail,  doing 
little  curlicues  in  the  brown  wet  paint  to  make  it  look 
like  what  the  wood  was  at  first  before  it  was  painted 
at  all.  'Well,'  he  says,  'I  suspected  from  the  assays 
that  we  might  get  a  bit  more,  but  if  he  had  experts 
with  him  you  better  let  him  have  it  for  twelve  hun- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  137 

dred.  After  all,  twelve  hundred  dollars  is  a  good  bit 
of  money.' 

"'Twelve  hundred  thousand,'  says  Snowstorm, 
still  grouchy. 

"'Oh,'  says  Angus.  'In  that  case  don't  let  him 
have  it.  If  the  shark  offers  that  it'll  be  worth  more. 
I'll  go  into  the  mining  business  myself  as  soon  as  I've 
done  this  door  and  the  wainscoting  and  give  them 
their  varnish.' 

"He  did  so.  He  had  the  International  finished 
in  three  more  days,  turned  down  a  job  in  the  new 
bank  building  cold,  and  went  into  the  mining  business 
just  like  he'd  do  anything  else — slow  and  sure,  yet 
impetuous  here  and  there.  It  wasn't  a  hard  proposi 
tion,  the  stuff  being  there  nearly  from  the  grass  roots, 
and  the  money  soon  come  a-plenty.  Snowstorm 
not  only  got  things  trimmed  up  but  had  'em  dyed 
black  as  a  crow's  wing  and  retired  to  a  life  of  sinful 
ease  in  Spokane,  eating  bacon  and  beans  and  cocoanut 
custard  pie  three  times  a  day  till  the  doctors  found 
out  what  a  lot  of  expensive  things  he  had  the  matter 
with  him. 

"Angus  not  only  kept  on  the  job  but  branched  out 
into  other  mines  that  he  bought  up,  and  pretty  soon 
he  quit  counting  his  money.  You  know  what  that 
would  mean  to  most  of  his  race.  It  fazed  him  a  mite 
at  first.  He  tried  faithfully  to  act  like  a  crazy  fool 
with  his  money,  experimenting  with  revelry  and 
champagne  for  breakfast,  and  buying  up  the  Sans 
Soosy  dance  hall  every  Saturday  night  for  his  friends 


138          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

and  admirers.  But  he  wasn't  gaited  to  go  on  that 
track  long.  Even  Ellabelle  wasn't  worried  the  least 
bit,  and  in  fact  she  thought  something  of  the  kind 
was  due  his  position.  And  she  was  busy  herself 
buying  the  things  that  are  champagne  to  a  woman, 
only  they're  kept  on  the  outside.  That  was  when 
Angus  told  her  if  she  was  going  in  for  diamonds  at  all 
to  get  enough  so  she  could  appear  to  be  wasteful 
and  contemptuous  of  them.  Two  thousand  she 
give  for  one  little  diamond  circlet  to  pin  her  napkin 
up  on  her  chest  with.  It  was  her  own  idea. 

"Then  Angus  for  a  time  complicated  his  amateur 
debauchery  with  fast  horses.  He  got  him  a  pair  of 
matched  pacing  stallions  that  would  go  anywhere,  he 
said.  And  he  frequently  put  them  there  when  he 
had  the  main  chandelier  lighted.  In  driving  them 
over  a  watering- trough  one  night  an  accident  of  some 
sort  happened.  Angus  didn't  come  to  till  after  his 
leg  was  set  and  the  stitches  in — eight  in  one  place, 
six  in  another,  and  so  on;  I  wonder  why  they're 
always  so  careful  to  count  the  stitches  in  a  person 
that  way — and  he  wished  to  know  if  his  new  side-bar 
buggy  was  safe  and  they  told  him  it  wasn't,  and  he 
wanted  to  know  where  his  team  was,  but  nobody 
knew  that  for  three  days,  so  he  says  to  the  doctors 
and  Ellabelle:  'Hereafter  I  suspect  I  shall  take  only 
soft  drinks  like  beer  and  sherry.  Champagne  has  a 
bonnier  look  but  it's  too  enterprising.  I  might  get 
into  trouble  some  time.'  And  he's  done  so  to  this  day. 
Oh,  I've  seen  him  take  a  sip  or  two  of  champagne 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  139 

to  some  one's  health,  or  as  much  Scotch  whiskey  in  a 
tumbler  of  water  as  you  could  dribble  from  a  medium- 
boilered  fountain  pen.  But  that's  a  high  riot  with 
him.  He'll  eat  one  of  these  corned  peaches  in 
brandy,  and  mebbe  take  a  cream  pitcher  of  beer  on 
his  oatmeal  of  a  morning  when  his  stomach  don't  feel 
just  right,  but  he's  never  been  a  willing  performer 
since  that  experiment  in  hurdling. 

"When  he  could  walk  again  him  and  Ellabelle 
moved  to  the  International  Hotel,  where  she  wouldn't 
have  to  cook  or  split  kindling  and  could  make  a 
brutal  display  of  diamonds  at  every  meal,  and  we 
went  down  to  see  them.  That  was  when  Angus  give 
Lysander  John  the  scarfpin  he'd  sent  clear  to  New 
York  for — a  big  gold  bull's  head  with  ruby  eyes  and 
in  its  mouth  a  nugget  of  platinum  set  with  three 
diamonds.  Of  course  Lysander  John  never  dast 
wear  it  except  when  Angus  was  going  to  see  it. 

"Then  along  comes  Angus,  Junior,  though  poor 
Ellabelle  thinks  for  several  days  that  he's  El  win. 
We'd  gone  down  so  I  could  be  with  her. 

'"Elwin  is  the  name  I  have  chosen  for  my  son,' 
says  she  to  Angus  the  third  day. 

"'Not  so,'  says  Angus,  slumping  down  his  one 
eyebrow  clear  across  in  a  firm  manner.  'You're  too 
late.  My  son  is  already  named.  I  named  him 
Angus  the  night  before  he  was  born.' 

'"How  could  you  do  that  when  you  didn't  know 
the  sex?'  demands  Ellabelle  with  a  frightened  air  of 
triumph. 


140          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED_GAP 

"'I  did  it,  didn't  I?'  says  Angus.  'Then  why  ask 
how  I  could?'  And  he  curved  the  eyebrow  up  one 
side  and  down  the  other  in  a  fighting  way. 

"Ellabelle  had  been  wedded  wife  of  Angus  long 
enough  to  know  when  the  Scotch  curse  was  on  him. 
'Very  well,'  she  says,  though  turning  her  face  to  the 
wall.  Angus  straightened  the  eyebrow.  'Like  we 
might  have  two  now,  one  of  each  kind,'  says  he  quite 
soft,  'you'd  name  your  daughter  as  you  liked,  with 
perhaps  no  more  than  a  bit  of  a  suggestion  from  me, 
to  be  taken  or  not  by  you,  unless  we'd  contend 
amiably  about  it  for  a  length  of  time  till  we  had  it 
settled  right  as  it  should  be.  But  a  son — my  son — 
why,  look  at  the  chest  on  him  already,  projecting 
outward  like  a  clock  shelf — and  you  would  name  him 
— but  no  matter!  I  was  forehanded,  thank  God.' 
Oh,  you  saw  plainly  that  in  case  a  girl  ever  come  along 
Ellabelle  would  have  the  privilege  of  naming  it  any 
thing  in  the  world  she  wanted  to  that  Angus  thought 
suitable. 

"So  that  was  settled  reasonably,  and  Angus  went 
on  showing  what  to  do  with  your  mine  instead  of 
selling  it  to  a  shark,  and  the  baby  fatted  up,  being 
stall-fed,  and  Ellabelle  got  out  into  the  world  again, 
with  more  money  than  ever  to  spend,  but  fewer 
things  to  buy,  because  in  Wallace  she  couldn't  think 
of  any  more.  Trust  her,  though!  First  the  Inter 
national  Hotel  wasn't  good  enough.  Angus  said 
they'd  have  a  mansion,  the  biggest  in  Wallace,  only 
without  slippery  hardwood  floors,  because  he  felt 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  141 

brittle  after  his  accident.  Ellabelle  says  Wallace 
itself  ain't  big  enough  for  the  mansion  that  ought  to 
be  a  home  to  his  only  son.  She  was  learning  how  to 
get  to  Angus  without  seeming  to.  He  thought  there 
might  be  something  in  that,  still  he  didn't  like  to 
trust  the  child  away  from  him,  and  he  had  to  stick 
there  for  a  while. 

"So  Ellabelle's  health  broke  down.  Yes,  sir,  she 
got  to  be  a  total  wreck.  Of  course  the  fool  doctor 
in  Wallace  couldn't  find  it  out.  She  tried  him  and  he 
told  her  she  was  strong  as  a  horse  and  ought  to  be 
doing  a  tub  of  washing  that  very  minute.  Which 
was  no  way  to  talk  to  the  wife  of  a  rich  mining  man, 
so  he  lost  quite  a  piece  of  money  by  it.  Ellabelle 
then  went  to  Spokane  and  consulted  a  specialist. 
That's  the  difference.  You  only  see  a  doctor,  but  a 
specialist  you  consult.  This  one  confirmed  her  fears 
about  herself  in  a  very  gentlemanly  way  and  reaped 
his  reward  on  the  spot.  Ellabelle's  came  after  she  had 
convinced  Angus  that  even  if  she  did  have  such  a  good 
appetite  it  wasn't  a  normal  one,  but  it  was,  in  fact, 
one  of  her  worst  symptoms  and  threatened  her  with 
a  complete  nervous  breakdown.  After  about  a  year 
of  this,  when  Angus  had  horned  his  way  into  a  few 
more  mines — he  said  he  might  as  well  have  a  bunch 
of  them  since  he  couldn't  be  there  on  the  spot  any 
way — they  went  to  New  York  City.  Angus  had 
never  been  there  except  to  pass  from  a  Clyde  liner 
to  Jersey  City,  and  they  do  say  that  when  he  heard 
the  rates,  exclusive  of  board,  at  the  one  Ellabelle 


142  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

had  picked  out  from  reading  the  papers,  he  timidly 
asked  her  if  they  hadn't  ought  to  go  to  the  other 
hotel.  She  told  him  there  wasn't  any  other — not  for 
them.  She  told  him  further  it  was  part  of  her  mission 
to  broaden  his  horizon,  and  she  firmly  meant  to  do  it 
if  God  would  only  vouchsafe  her  a  remnant  of  her 
once  magnificent  vitality. 

"She  didn't  have  to  work  so  hard  either.  Angus 
begun  to  get  a  broader  horizon  in  just  a  few  days, 
corrupting  every  waiter  he  came  in  contact  with, 
and  there  was  a  report  round  the  hotel  the  summer 
I  was  there  that  a  hat-boy  had  actually  tried  to 
reason  with  him,  thinking  he  was  a  foreigner  making 
mistakes  with  his  money  by  giving  up  a  dollar  bill 
every  time  for  having  his  hat  snatched  from  him. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  Angus  can't  believe  to  this  day 
that  dollar  bills  are  money.  He  feels  apologetic 
when  he  gives  'em  away.  All  the  same  I  never  be 
lieved  that  report  about  the  hat-boy  till  some  one 
explained  to  me  that  he  wasn't  allowed  to  keep  his 
loot,  not  only  having  clothes  made  special  without 
pockets  but  being  searched  to  the  hide  every  night 
like  them  poor  unfortunate  Zulus  that  toil  in  the 
diamond  mines  of  Africa.  Of  course  I  could  see  then 
that  this  boy  had  become  merely  enraged  like  a  wild 
cat  at  having  a  dollar  crowded  onto  him  for  some  one 
else  every  time  a  head  waiter  grovelled  Angus  out  of 
the  restaurant. 

"The  novelty  of  that  life  wore  off  after  about  a 
year,  even  with  side  trips  to  resorts  where  the  prices 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  143 

were  sufficiently  outrageous  to  charm  Ellabelle. 
She'd  begun  right  off  to  broaden  her  own  horizon. 
After  only  one  week  in  New  York  she  put  her  diamond 
napkin  pincher  to  doing  other  work,  and  after  six 
months  she  dressed  about  as  well  as  them  promi 
nent  society  ladies  that  drift  round  the  corridors 
of  this  hotel  waiting  for  parties  that  never  seem 
on  time,  and  looking  none  too  austere  while  they 
wait. 

"So  Ellabelle,  having  in  the  meantime  taken  up 
art  and  literature  and  gone  to  lectures  where  the 
professor  would  show  sights  and  scenes  in  foreign 
lands  with  his  magic  lantern,  begun  to  feel  the  call 
of  the  Old  World.  She'd  got  far  beyond  'Lucile'— 
though  *  Peck's  Bad  Boy'  was  still  the  favourite  of 
Angus  when  he  got  time  for  any  serious  reading — 
and  was  coming  to  loathe  the  crudities  of  our  so- 
called  American  civilization.  So  she  said.  She 
begun  to  let  out  to  Angus  that  they  wasn't  doing 
right  by  the  little  one,  bringing  him  up  in  a  hole  like 
New  York  City  where  he'd  catch  the  American 
accent — though  God  knows  where  she  ever  noticed 
that  danger  there ! — and  it  was  only  fair  to  the  child 
to  get  him  to  England  or  Paris  or  some  such  place 
where  he  could  have  decent  advantages.  I  gather 
that  Angus  let  out  a  holler  at  first  so  that  Ellabelle 
had  to  consult  another  specialist  and  have  little 
Angus  consult  one,  too.  They  both  said :  *  Certainly, 
don't  delay  another  day  if  you  value  the  child's  life 
or  your  own,'  and  of  course  Angus  had  to  give  in.  I 


144  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

reckon  that  was  the  last  real  fight  he  ever  put  up  till 
the  time  I'm  going  to  tell  you  about. 

"They  went  to  England  and  bought  a  castle  that 
had  never  known  the  profane  touch  of  a  plumber, 
having  been  built  in  the  time  of  the  first  earl  or  some 
thing,  and  after  that  they  had  to  get  another  castle 
in  France,  account  of  little  Angus  having  a  weak 
throat  that  Ellabelle  got  another  gentlemanly  special 
ist  to  find  out  about  him;  and  so  it  went,  with  Ella- 
belle  hovering  on  the  very  edge  of  a  nervous  break 
down,  and  taking  up  art  and  literature  at  different 
spots  where  fashion  gathered,  going  to  Italy  and 
India's  coral  strand  to  study  the  dead  past,  and  so 
forth,  and  learning  to  address  her  inferiors  in  a  refined 
and  hostile  manner,  with  little  Angus  having  a  maid 
and  a  governess  and  something  new  the  matter  with 
him  every  time  Ellabelle  felt  the  need  of  a  change. 

"At  first  Angus  used  to  make  two  trips  back  every 
year,  then  he  cut  them  down  to  one,  and  at  last  he'd 
only  come  every  two  or  three  years,  having  his  hire 
lings  come  to  him  instead.  He'd  branched  out  a  lot, 
even  at  that  distance,  getting  into  copper  and  such, 
and  being  president  of  banks  and  trusts  here  and 
there  and  equitable  cooperative  companies  and  all 
such  things  that  help  to  keep  the  lower  classes 
trimmed  proper.  For  a  whole  lot  of  years  I  didn't 
see  either  of  'em.  I  sort  of  lost  track  of  the  outfit, 
except  as  I'd  see  the  name  of  Angus  heading  a  new 
board  of  directors  after  the  reorganization,  or  renting 
the  north  half  of  Scotland  for  the  sage-hen  and  coyote 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  145 

shooting,  or  whatever  the  game  is  there.  Of  course 
it  took  genius  to  do  this  with  Angus,  and  I've  never 
denied  that  Ellabelle  has  it.  I  bet  there  wasn't  a 
day  in  all  them  years  that  Angus  didn't  believe  him 
self  to  be  a  stubborn,  domineering  brute,  riding 
roughshod  over  the  poor  little  wreck  of  a  woman. 
If  he  didn't  it  wasn't  for  want  of  his  wife  accusing 
him  of  it  in  so  many  words — and  perhaps  a  few  more. 

"I  guess  she  got  to  feeling  so  sure  of  herself  she  let 
her  work  coarsen  up.  Anyway,  when  little  Angus 
come  to  be  eighteen  his  pa  shocked  her  one  day  by 
saying  he  must  go  back  home  to  some  good  college. 
'You  mean  England,'  says  Ellabelle,  they  being  at 
the  time  on  some  other  foreign  domains. 

"'I  do  not,'  says  Angus,  'nor  Sweden  nor  Japan 
nor  East  Africa.  I  mean  the  United  States.'  'You're 
jesting,'  says  she.  'You  wrong  me  cruelly,'  says 
Angus.  'The  lad's  eighteen  and  threatening  to  be  a 
foreigner.  Should  he  stay  here  longer  it  would  set  in 
his  blood.'  'Remember  his  weak  throat,'  says  Ella- 
belle.  'I  did,'  says  Angus.  'To  save  you  trouble 
I  sent  for  a  specialist  to  look  him  over.  He  says  the 
lad  has  never  a  flaw  in  his  throat.  We'll  go  soon.* 

"Of  course  it  was  dirty  work  on  the  part  of  Angus, 
getting  to  the  specialist  first,  but  she  saw  she  had  to 
take  it.  She  knew  it  was  like  the  time  they  agreed  on 
his  name — she  could  see  the  Scotch  blood  leaping  in 
his  veins.  So  she  gave  in  with  never  a  mutter  that 
Angus  could  hear.  That's  part  of  the  genius  of  Ella- 
belle,  knowing  when  she  can  and  when  she  positively 


146  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

cannot,  and  making  no  foolish  struggle  in  the  latter 
event. 

"Back  they  come  to  New  York  and  young  Angus 
went  to  the  swellest  college  Ellabelle  could  learn 
about,  and  they  had  a  town  house  and  a  country 
house  and  Ellabelle  prepared  to  dazzle  New  York 
society,  having  met  frayed  ends  of  it  in  her  years 
abroad.  But  she  couldn't  seem  to  put  it  over.  Lots 
of  male  and  female  society  foreigners  that  she'd  met 
would  come  and  put  up  with  her  and  linger  on  in  the 
most  friendly  manner,  but  Ellabelle  never  fools  her 
self  so  very  much.  She  knew  she  wasn't  making  the 
least  dent  in  New  York  itself.  She  got  uncomfort 
able  there.  I  bet  she  had  that  feeling  you  get  when 
you're  riding  your  horse  over  soft  ground  and  all  at 
once  he  begins  to  bog  down. 

"Anyway,  they  come  West  after  a  year  or  so, 
where  Angus  had  more  drag  and  Ellabelle  could  feel 
more  important.  Not  back  to  Wallace,  of  course. 
Ellabelle  had  forgotten  the  name  of  that  town,  and 
also  they  come  over  a  road  that  misses  the  thriving 
little  town  of  North  Platte  by  several  hundred  miles. 
And  pretty  soon  they  got  into  this  darned  swell  little 
suburb  out  from  San  Francisco,  through  knowing  one 
of  the  old  families  that  had  lived  there  man  and  boy 
for  upward  of  four  years.  It's  a  town  where  I  be 
lieve  they  won't  let  you  get  off  the  train  unless  you 
got  a  visitor's  card  and  a  valet. 

"Here  at  last  Ellabelle  felt  she  might  come  into  her 
own,  for  parties  seemed  to  recognize  her  true  worth  at 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  147 

once.  Some  of  them  indeed  she  could  buffalo  right 
on  the  spot,  for  she  hadn't  lived  in  Europe  and  such 
places  all  them  years  for  nothing.  So,  camping  in  a 
miserable  rented  shack  that  never  cost  a  penny  over 
seventy  thousand  dollars,  with  only  thirty-eight 
rooms  and  no  proper  space  for  the  servants,  they  set 
to  work  building  their  present  marble  palace — there's 
inside  and  outside  pictures  of  it  in  a  magazine  some 
where  round  here — bigger  than  the  state  insane 
asylum  and  very  tasty  and  expensive,  with  hand- 
painted  ceilings  and  pergolas  and  cafes  and  hot  and 
cold  water  and  everything. 

"It  was  then  I  first  see  Ellabelle  after  all  the  years, 
and  I  want  to  tell  you  she  was  impressive.  She 
looked  like  the  descendant  of  a  long  line  of  ancestry 
or  something  and  she  spoke  as  good  as  any  reciter  you 
ever  heard  in  a  hall.  Last  time  I  had  seen  her  she 
was  still  forgetting  about  the  r's — she'd  say:  'Oh, 
there-urr  you  ah!'  thus  showing  she  was  at  least 
half  Iowa  in  breed — but  nothing  like  that  now.  She 
could  give  the  English  cards  and  spades  and  beat 
them  at  their  own  game.  Her  face  looked  a  little  bit 
overmassaged  and  she  was  having  trouble  keeping 
her  hips  down,  and  wore  a  patent  chin-squeezer 
nights,  and  her  hair  couldn't  be  trusted  to  itself  long 
at  a  time;  but  she  knew  how  to  dress  and  she'd 
learned  decency  in  the  use  of  the  diamond  except 
when  it  was  really  proper  to  break  out  all  over  with 
'em.  You'd  look  at  her  twice  in  any  show  ring. 
Ain't  women  the  wonders !  Gazing  at  Ellabelle  when 


148  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

she  had  everything  on,  you'd  never  dream  that  she'd 
come  up  from  the  vilest  dregs  only  a  few  years  before 
— helping  cook  for  the  harvest  hands  in  Iowa,  feeding 
Union  Pacific  passengers  at  twenty -two  a  month,  or 
splitting  her  own  kindling  at  Wallace,  Idaho,  and 
dreaming  about  a  new  silk  dress  for  next  year,  or 
mebbe  the  year  after  if  things  went  well. 

"Men  ain't  that  way.  Angus  had  took  no  care  of 
his  figure,  which  was  now  pouchy,  his  hair  was  gray, 
and  he  was  either  shedding  or  had  been  roached,  and 
he  had  lines  of  care  and  food  in  his  face,  and  took  no 
pains  whatever  with  his  accent — or  with  what  he 
said,  for  that  matter.  I  never  saw  a  man  yet  that 
could  hide  a  disgraceful  past  like  a  woman  can. 
They  don't  seem  to  have  any  pride.  Most  of  'em  act 
like  they  don't  care  a  hoot  whether  people  find  it  out 
on  'em  or  not. 

"Angus  was  always  reckless  that  way,  adding  to  his 
wife's  burden  of  anxiety.  She'd  got  her  own  vile 
past  well  buried,  but  she  never  knew  when  his  was 
going  to  stick  its  ugly  head  up  out  of  its  grave.  He'd 
go  along  all  right  for  a  while  like  one  of  the  best  set 
had  ought  to — then  Zooey !  We  was  out  to  dinner  at 
another  millionaire's  one  night — in  that  town  you're 
either  a  millionaire  or  drawing  wages  from  one — and 
Angus  talked  along  with  his  host  for  half  an  hour 
about  the  impossibility  of  getting  a  decent  valet  on 
this  side  of  the  water,  Americans  not  knowing  their 
place  like  the  English  do,  till  you'd  have  thought  he 
was  born  to  it,  and  then  all  at  once  he  breaks  out 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  149 

about  the  hardwood  finish  to  the  dining-room,  and 
how  the  art  of  graining  has  perished  and  ought  to  be 
revived.  'And  I  wish  I  had  a  silver  dollar,'  he  says, 
'for  every  door  like  that  one  there  that  I've  grained 
to  resemble  the  natural  wood  so  cunningly  you'd  never 
guess  it — hardly.' 

"At  that  his  break  didn't  faze  any  one  but  Ella- 
belle.  The  host  was  an  old  train-robber  who'd  cut 
your  throat  for  two  bits — I'll  bet  he  couldn't  play  an 
honest  game  of  solitaire — and  he  let  out  himself  right 
off  that  he  had  once  worked  in  a  livery  stable  and  was 
proud  of  it;  but  poor  Ellabelle,  who'd  been  talking 
about  the  dear  Countess  of  Comtessa  or  somebody, 
and  the  dukes  and  earls  that  was  just  one-two-three 
with  her  on  the  other  side,  she  blushed  up  till  it  almost 
showed  through  the  second  coating.  Angus  was 
certainly  poison  ivy  to  her  on  occasion,  and  he'd  re 
fuse  to  listen  to  reason  when  she  called  him  down 
about  it.  He'd  do  most  of  the  things  she  asked  him 
to  about  food  and  clothes  and  so  forth — like  the  time 
he  had  the  two  gold  teeth  took  out  and  replaced  by 
real  porcelain  nature  fakers — but  he  never  could 
understand  why  he  wasn't  free  to  chat  about  the  days 
when  he  earned  what  money  he  had. 

"It  was  this  time  that  I  first  saw  little  Angus  since 
he  had  changed  from  a  governess  to  a  governor — or 
whatever  they  call  the  he-teacher  of  a  millionaire's 
brat.  He  was  home  for  the  summer  vacation.  Nat 
urally  I'd  been  prejudiced  against  him  not  only  by 
his  mother's  praise  but  by  his  father's  steady  copper- 


150  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

ing  of  the  same.  Judiciously  comparing  the  two,  I 
was  led  to  expect  a  kind  of  cross  between  Little  Lord 
Fauntleroy  and  the  late  Sitting  Bull,  with  the  vices 
of  each  and  the  virtues  of  neither.  Instead  of  which 
I  found  him  a  winsome  whelp  of  six-foot  or  so  with 
Scotch  eyes  and  his  mother's  nose  and  chin  and  a 
good,  big,  straight  mouth,  and  full  of  the  most  en 
gaging  bedevilments  for  one  and  all.  He  didn't 
seem  to  be  any  brighter  in  his  studies  than  a  brute  of 
that  age  should  be,  and  though  there  was  something 
easy  and  grand  in  his  manner  that  his  pa  and  ma 
never  had,  he  wasn't  really  any  more  foreign  than 
what  I  be.  Of  course  he  spoke  Eastern  American  in 
stead  of  Western,  but  you  forgive  him  that  after  a  few 
minutes  when  you  see  how  nice  he  naturally  meant  to 
be.  I  admit  we  took  to  each  other  from  the  start. 
They  often  say  I'm  a  good  mixer,  but  it  took  no  talent 
to  get  next  to  that  boy.  I  woke  up  the  first  night 
thinking  I  knew  what  old  silly  would  do  her  darndest 
to  adopt  him  if  ever  his  poor  pa  and  ma  was  to  get 
buttered  over  the  right  of  way  in  some  railroad 
accident. 

"And  yet  I  didn't  see  Angus,  Junior,  one  bit  the 
way  either  of  his  parents  saw  him.  Ellabelle  seemed 
to  look  on  him  merely  as  a  smart  dresser  and  social 
know-it-all  that  would  be  a  98  cent  credit  to  her 
in  the  position  of  society  queen  for  which  the  good 
God  had  always  intended  her.  And  his  father 
said  he  wasn't  any  good  except  to  idle  away  his  time 
and  spend  money,  and  would  come  to  a  bad  end 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  151 

by  manslaughter  in  a  high-powered  car;  or  in  the 
alcoholic  ward  of  some  hospital;  that  he  was,  in  fact, 
a  mere  helling  scapegrace  that  would  have  been  put 
in  some  good  detention  home  years  before  if  he  hadn't 
been  born  to  a  father  that  was  all  kinds  of  a  so-and-so 
old  Scotch  fool.  There  you  get  Angus,  fills,  from 
three  different  slants,  and  I  ain't  saying  there  wasn't 
justification  for  the  other  two  besides  mine.  The 
boy  could  act  in  a  crowd  of  tea-drinking  women  with 
a  finish  that  made  his  father  look  like  some  one  edging 
in  to  ask  where  they  wanted  the  load  of  coal  dumped. 
But  also  Angus,  peer,  was  merely  painting  the  lily,  as 
they  say,  when  he'd  tell  all  the  different  kinds  of 
Indian  the  boy  was.  That  very  summer  before  he 
went  back  to  the  educational  centre  where  they 
teach  such  arts,  he  helped  wreck  a  road  house  a  few 
miles  up  the  line  till  it  looked  like  one  of  them 
pictures  of  what  a  Zeppelin  does  to  a  rare  old  English 
drug  store  in  London.  And  a  week  later  he  lost  a  race 
with  the  Los  Angeles  flyer,  account  of  not  having  as 
good  a  roadbed  to  run  on  as  the  train  had,  and  having 
to  take  too  short  a  turn  with  his  new  car. 

"I  remember  we  three  was  wondering  where  he 
could  be  that  night  the  telephone  rung  from  the  place 
where  kindly  strangers  had  hauled  him  for  first  aid  to 
the  foolish.  But  it  was  the  boy  himself  that  was  able 
to  talk  and  tell  his  anxious  parents  to  forget  all  about 
it.  His  father  took  the  message  and  as  soon  as  he 
got  the  sense  of  it  he  begun  to  get  hopeful  that  the  kid 
had  broke  at  least  one  leg — thinking,  he  must  have 


152          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

been,  of  the  matched  pacing  stallions  that  once 
did  himself  such  a  good  turn  without  meaning  to. 
His  disappointment  was  pitiful  as  he  turned  to  us 
after  learning  that  he  had  lit  on  his  head  but  only 
sustained  a  few  bruises  and  sprains  and  concussions, 
with  the  wall-paper  scraped  off  here  and  there. 

'"Struck  on  his  head,  the  only  part  of  him  that 
seems  invulnerable/  says  the  fond  father.  'What's 
that?'  he  yells,  for  the  boy  was  talking  again.  He 
listened  a  minute,  and  it  was  right  entertaining  to 
watch  his  face  work  as  the  words  come  along.  It  reg 
istered  all  the  evil  that  Scotland  has  suffered  from  her 
oppressors  since  they  first  thought  up  the  name  for  it. 
Finally  he  begun  to  splutter  back — it  must  have 
sounded  fine  at  the  other  end — but  he  had  to  hang  up, 
he  was  that  emotional.  After  he  got  his  face  human 
again  he  says  to  us: 

'"Would  either  of  you  think  now  that  you  could 
guess  at  what  might  have  been  his  dying  speech? 
Would  you  guess  it  might  be  words  of  cheer  to  the  be 
reaved  mother  that  nursed  him,  or  even  a  word  of 
comfort  to  the  idiot  father  that  never  touched  whip- 
leather  to  his  back  while  he  was  still  husky  enough  to 
get  by  with  it?  Well,  you'd  guess  wild.  He's  but 
inflamed  with  indignation  over  the  state  of  the  road 
where  he  passed  out  for  some  minutes.  He  says  it's  a 
disgrace  to  any  civilized  community,  and  he  means  to 
make  trouble  about  it  with  the  county  supervisor, 
who  must  be  a  murderer  at  heart,  and  then  he'll  take 
it  up  to  the  supreme  court  and  see  if  we  can't  have 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  153 

roads  in  this  country  as  good  as  Napoleon  the  First 
made  them  build  in  France,  so  a  gentleman  can 
speed  up  a  bit  over  five  miles  an  hour  without  break 
ing  every  bone  in  his  body,  to  say  nothing  of  totally 
ruining  a  car  costing  forty-eight  hundred  dollars 
of  his  good  money,  with  the  ink  on  the  check  for  it 
scarce  dry.  He  was  going  on  to  say  that  he  had  the 
race  for  the  crossing  as  good  as  won  and  had  just 
waved  mockingly  at  the  engineer  of  the  defeated  train 
who  was  pretending  to  feel  indifferent  about  it — but 
I  hung  up  on  him.  My  strength  was  waning.  Was 
he  here  this  minute  I  make  no  doubt  I'd  go  to  the 
mat  with  him,  unequal  as  we  are  in  prowess.'  He 
dribbled  off  into  vicious  mutterings  of  what  he'd  say 
to  the  boy  if  he  was  to  come  to  the  door. 

"Then  dear  Ellabelle  pipes  up:  'And  doesn't  the 
dear  boy  say  who  was  with  him  in  this  prank?' 

"Angus  snorted  horribly  at  the  word  'prank,'  just 
like  he'd  never  had  one  single  advantage  of  foreign 
travel.  'He  does  indeed — one  of  those  Hammer 
smith  twin  louts  was  with  him — the  speckled  devil 
with  the  lisp,  I  gather — and  praise  God  his  bones,  at 
least,  are  broke  in  two  places!' 

"Ellabelle's  eyes  shined  up  at  this  with  real  de 
light.  'How  terrible!'  she  says,  not  looking  it. 
'That's  Gerald  Hammersmith,  son  of  Mrs.  St.  John 
Hammersmith,  leader  of  the  most  exclusive  set  here— 
oh,  she's  quite  in  the  lead  of  everything  that  has 
class!  And  after  this  we  must  know  each  other  far, 
far  better  than  we  have  in  the  past.  She  has  nevei 


154  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

called  up  to  this  time.  I  must  inquire  after  her  poor 
boy  directly  to-morrow  comes.'  That  is  Ellabelle. 
Trust  her  not  to  overlook  a  single  bet. 

"Angus  again  snorted  in  a  common  way.  'St. 
John  Hammersmith!'  says  he,  steaming  up.  'When 
he  trammed  ore  for  three-fifty  a  day  and  went  to  bed 
with  his  clothes  on  any  night  he'd  the  price  of  a  quart 
of  gin-and-beer  mixed — liking  to  get  his  quick — his 
name  was  naked  'John'  with  never  a  Saint  to  it, 
which  his  widow  tacked  on  a  dozen  years  later.  And 
speaking  of  names,  Mrs.  McDonald,  I  sorely  regret 
you  didn't  name  your  own  son  after  your  first  willful 
fancy.  It  was  no  good  day  for  his  father  when  you 
put  my  own  name  to  him.' 

"But  Ellabelle  paid  no  attention  whatever  to  this 
rough  stuff,  being  already  engaged  in  courting  the 
Hammersmith  dame  for  the  good  of  her  social  im 
portance.  I  make  no  doubt  before  the  maid  finished 
rubbing  in  the  complexion  cream  that  night  she  had 
reduced  this  upstart  to  the  ranks  and  stepped  into  her 
place  as  leader  of  the  most  exclusive  social  set  be 
tween  South  San  Francisco  and  old  Henry  Miller's 
ranch  house  at  Gilroy.  Anyway,  she  kept  talking  to 
herself  about  it,  almost  over  the  mangled  remains  of 
her  own  son,  as  you  might  say. 

"A  year  later  the  new  mansion  was  done,  setting  in 
the  centre  of  sixty  acres  of  well-manicured  land  as 
flat  as  a  floor  and  naturally  called  Hillcrest.  Angus 
asked  me  down  for  another  visit.  There  had  been 
grand  doings  to  open  the  new  house,  and  Ellabelle 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          155 

felt  she  was  on  the  way  to  ruling  things  social  with  an 
iron  hand  if  she  was  just  careful  and  didn't  overbet 
her  cards.  Angus,  not  being  ashamed  of  his  scan 
dalous  past,  was  really  all  that  kept  her  nerves 
strung  up.  It  seems  he'd  give  her  trouble  while  the 
painters  and  decorators  was  at  work,  hanging  round 
'em  fascinated  and  telling  'em  how  he'd  had  to  work 
ten  hours  a  day  in  his  time  and  how  he  could  grain  a 
door  till  it  looked  exactly  like  the  natural  wood,  so 
they'd  say  it  wasn't  painted  at  all.  And  one  day  he 
become  so  inflamed  with  evil  desire  that  Ellabelle, 
escorting  a  bunch  of  the  real  triple-platers  through  the 
mansion,  found  him  with  his  coat  off  learning  how  to 
rub  down  a  hardwood  panel  with  oil  and  pumice 
stone.  Gee!  Wouldn't  I  like  to  of  been  there!  I 
suppose  I  got  a  lower  nature  as  well  as  the  rest  of  us. 
"After  I'd  been  there  a  few  days,  along  comes 
Angus,  fills,  out  into  the  world  from  college  to  make  a 
name  for  himself.  By  ingenuity  or  native  brute 
force  he  had  contrived  to  graduate.  He  was  nice  as 
ever  and  told  me  he  was  going  to  look  about  a  bit  un 
til  he  could  decide  what  his  field  of  endeavour  should 
be.  Apparently  it  was  breaking  his  neck  in  outdoor 
sports,  including  loop-the-loop  in  his  new  car  on  roads 
not  meant  for  it,  and  delighting  Ellabelle  because  he 
was  a  fine  social  drag  in  her  favour,  and  enraging  his 
father  by  the  same  reasons.  Ellabelle  was  especially 
thrilled  by  his  making  up  to  a  girl  that  was  daughter 
to  this  here  old  train-robber  I  mentioned.  It  was 
looking  like  he  might  form  an  alliance,  as  they  say, 


156  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

with  this  old  family  which  had  lived  quite  a  decent 
life  since  they  actually  got  it.  The  girl  looked  to  me 
nice  enough  even  for  Angus,  Junior,  but  his  pa  de 
nounced  her  as  a  yellow-haired  pest  with  none  but 
frivolous  aims  in  life,  who  wouldn't  know  whether  a 
kitchen  was  a  room  in  a  house  or  a  little  woolly 
animal  from  Paraguay.  We  had  some  nice,  friendly 
breakfasts,  I  believe  not,  whilst  they  discussed  this 
poisonous  topic,  old  Angus  being  only  further  em 
bittered  when  it  comes  out  that  the  train-robber  is 
also  dead  set  against  this  here  alliance  because  his 
only  daughter  needs  a  decent,  reputable  man  who 
would  come  home  nights  from  some  low  mahogany 
den  in  a  bank  building,  and  not  a  worthless  young 
hound  that  couldn't  make  a  dollar  of  his  own  and  had 
displayed  no  talent  except  for  winning  the  notice  of 
head  waiters  and  policemen.  Old  Angus  says  he 
knows  well  enough  his  son  can  be  arrested  out  of  most 
crowds  just  on  that  description  alone,  but  who  is  this 
So-and-So  old  thug  to  be  saying  it  in  public? 

"And  so  it  went,  with  Ellabelle  living  in  high 
hopes  and  young  Angus  busy  inventing  new  ways 
to  bump  himself  off,  and  old  Angus  getting  more  and 
more  seething — quiet  enough  outside,  but  so  des 
perate  inside  that  it  wasn't  any  time  at  all  till  I  saw 
he  was  just  waiting  for  a  good  chance  to  make  some 
horrible  Scotch  exhibition  of  himself. 

"Then  comes  the  fatal  polo  doings,  with  young 
Angus  playing  on  the  side  that  won,  and  Ellabelle 
being  set  up  higher  than  ever  till  she  actually  begins 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  157 

to  snub  people  here  and  there  at  the  game  that  look 
like  they'd  swallow  it,  and  old  Angus  ashamed  and 
proud  and  glaring  round  as  if  he'd  like  to  hear  some 
one  besides  himself  call  his  son  a  worthless  young 
hound — if  they  wanted  to  start  something. 

"And  the  polo  victory  of  course  had  to  be  cele 
brated  by  a  banquet  at  the  hotel,  attended  by  all 
the  players  and  their  huskiest  ruffian  friends.  They 
didn't  have  the  ponies  there,  but  I  guess  they  would 
of  if  they'd  thought  of  it.  It  must  have  been  a 
good  banquet,  with  vintages  and  song  and  that  sort 
of  thing — I  believe  they  even  tried  to  have  food  at 
first — and  hearty  indoor  sports  with  the  china  and 
silver  and  chairs  that  had  been  thoughtlessly  pro 
vided  and  a  couple  of  big  mirrors  that  looked  as  if  you 
could  throw  a  catsup  bottle  clear  through  them,  only 
you  couldn't,  because  it  would  stop  there  after  merely 
breaking  the  glass,  and  spatter  in  a  helpless  way. 

"And  of  course  there  was  speeches.  The  best 
one,  as  far  as  I  could  learn,  was  made  by  the  owner 
of  the  outraged  premises  at  a  late  hour — when  the 
party  was  breaking  up — as  you  might  put  it.  He 
said  the  bill  would  be  about  eighteen  hundred  dollars, 
as  near  as  he  could  tell  at  first  glance.  He  was 
greeted  with  hearty  laughter  and  applause  from  the 
high-spirited  young  incendiaries  and  retired  hastily 
through  an  unsuspected  door  to  the  pantry  as  they 
rushed  for  him.  It  was  then  they  found  out  what 
to  do  with  the  rest  of  the  catsup — and  did  it — so  the 
walls  and  ceiling  wouldn't  look  so  monotonous,  and 


158  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

fixed  the  windows  so  they  would  let  out  the  foul 
tobacco  smoke,  and  completed  a  large  painting  of 
the  Yosemite  that  hung  on  the  wall,  doing  several 
things  to  it  that  hadn't  occurred  to  the  artist  in  his 
hurry,  and  performed  a  serious  operation  on  the 
piano  without  the  use  of  gas.  The  tables,  I  believe, 
was  left  flat  on  their  backs. 

"Angus,  fills,  was  fetched  home  in  a  car  by  a  gang 
of  his  roguish  young  playmates.  They  stopped  down 
on  the  stately  drive  under  my  window  and  a  quartet 
sung  a  pathetic  song  that  run: 

"Don't  forget  your  parents, 
Think  all  they  done  for  you  I 

"Then  young  Angus  ascended  the  marble  steps  to 
the  top  one,  bared  his  agreeable  head  to  the  moon 
light,  and  made  them  a  nice  speech  He  said  the 
campaign  now  in  progress,  fellow-citizens,  marked 
the  gravest  crisis  in  the  affairs  of  our  grand  old  state 
that  an  intelligent  constituency  had  ever  been  called 
upon  to  vote  down,  but  that  he  felt  they  were  on  the 
eve  of  a  sweeping  victory  that  would  sweep  the  cor 
rupt  hell-hounds  of  a  venal  opposition  into  an 
ignominy  from  which  they  would  never  be  swept  by 
any  base  act  of  his  while  they  honoured  him  with 
their  suffrages,  because  his  life  was  an  open  book  and 
he  challenged  any  son-of-a-gun  within  sound  of  his 
voice  to  challenge  this  to  his  face  or  take  the  conse 
quences  of  being  swept  into  oblivion  by  the  high  tide 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  159 

of  a  people's  indignation  that  would  sweep  everything 
before  it  on  the  third  day  of  November  next,  having 
been  aroused  in  its  might  at  last  from  the  debasing 
sloth  into  which  the  corrupt  hell-hounds  of  a  venal 
opposition  had  swept  them,  but  a  brighter  day  had 
dawned,  which  would  sweep  the  onrushing  hordes 
of  petty  chicanery  to  where  they  would  get  theirs; 
and,  as  one  who  had  heard  the  call  of  an  oppressed 
people,  he  would  accept  this  fitting  testimonial,  not 
for  its  intrinsic  worth  but  for  the  spirit  in  which  it 
was  tendered.  As  for  the  nefarious  tariff  on  watch 
springs,  sawed  lumber,  and  indigo,  he  would  defer 
his  masterly  discussion  of  these  burning  issues  to  a 
more  fitting  time  because  a  man  had  to  get  a  little 
sleep  now  and  then  or  he  wasn't  any  good  next  day. 
In  the  meantime  he  thanked  them  one  and  all,  and 
so,  gentlemen,  good-night. 

"The  audience  cheered  hoarsely  and  drove  off. 
I  guess  the  speech  would  have  been  longer  if  a  light 
hadn't  showed  in  the  east  wing  of  the  castle  where 
Angus,  peer,  slept.  And  then  all  was  peace  and 
quiet  till  the  storm  broke  on  a  rocky  coast  next  day. 
It  didn't  really  break  until  evening,  but  suspicious 
clouds  no  bigger  than  a  man's  hand  might  have  been 
observed  earlier.  If  young  Angus  took  any  break 
fast  that  morning  it  was  done  in  the  privacy  of  his 
apartment  under  the  pitying  glances  of  a  valet  or 
something.  But  here  he  was  at  lunch,  blithe  as  ever, 
and  full  of  merry  details  about  the  late  disaster.  He 
spoke  with  much  humour  about  a  wider  use  for 


160  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

tomato  catsup  than  was  ever  encouraged  by  the 
old  school  of  house  decorators.  Old  Angus  listened 
respectfully,  taking  only  a  few  bites  of  food  but 
chewing  them  long  and  thoughtfully.  Ellabelle  was 
chiefly  interested  in  the  names  of  the  hearty  young 
vandals.  She  was  delighted  to  learn  that  they  was 
all  of  the  right  set,  and  her  eyes  glowed  with  pride. 
The  eyes  of  Angus,  peer,  was  now  glowing  with  what 
I  could  see  was  something  else,  though  I  couldn't 
make  out  just  what  it  was.  He  never  once  exploded 
like  you'd  of  thought  he  was  due  to. 

"  Then  come  a  note  for  the  boy  which  the  perfect- 
mannered  Englishman  that  was  tending  us  said  was 
brought  by  a  messenger.  Young  Angus  glanced  at 
the  page  and  broke  out  indignantly.  'The  thieving 
old  pirate ! '  he  says.  *  Last  night  he  thought  it  would 
be  about  eighteen  hundred  dollars,  and  that  sounded 
hysterical  enough  for  the  few  little  things  we'd 
scratched  or  mussed  up.  I  told  him  he  would  doubt 
less  feel  better  this  morning,  but  in  any  event  to  send 
the  bill  to  me  and  I  would  pay  it.' 

"  'Quite  right  of  you,'  says  Ellabelle  proudly. 

"  'And  now  the  scoundrel  sends  me  one  for  twenty- 
three  hundred  and  odd.  He's  a  robber,  net!' 

"Old  Angus  said  never  a  word,  but  chewed  slowly, 
whilst  various  puzzling  expressions  chased  them 
selves  acrost  his  eloquent  face.  I  couldn't  make  a 
thing  out  of  any  of  them. 

"  'Never  patronize  the  fellow  again,'  says  Ellabelle 
warmly. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  161 

"'As  to  that,'  says  her  son,  'he  hinted  something 
last  night  about  having  me  arrested  if  I  ever  tried 
to  patronize  him  again,  but  that  isn't  the  point. 
He's  robbing  me  now.' 

"'Oh,  money!'  says  Ellabelle  in  a  low  tone  of 
disgust  and  with  a  gesture  like  she  was  rebuking  her 
son  for  mentioning  such  a  thing  before  the  servant. 

"  'But  I  don't  like  to  be  taken  advantage  of,'  says 
he,  looking  very  annoyed  and  grand.  Then  old 
Angus  swallowed  something  he'd  been  chewing  for 
eight  minutes  and  spoke  up  with  an  entirely  new 
expression  that  puzzled  me  more  than  ever. 

"  'If  you're  sure  you  have  the  right  of  it,  don't  you 
submit  to  the  outrage.' 

"Angus,  Junior,  backed  up  a  little  bit  at  this,  not 
knowing  quite  how  to  take  the  old  man's  mildness. 
'Oh,  of  course  the  fellow  might  win  out  if  he  took  it 
into  court,'  he  says.  'Every  one  knows  the  courts 
are  just  a  mass  of  corruption.' 

"'True,  I've  heard  gossip  to  that  effect,'  says  his 
father.  'Yet  there  must  be  some  way  to  thwart  the 
crook.  I'm  feeling  strangely  ingenious  at  the  mo 
ment.'  He  was  very  mild,  and  yet  there  was  some 
thing  sinister  and  Scotch  about  him  that  the  boy  felt. 

"'Of  course  I'd  pay  it  out  of  my  own  money,'  he 
remarks  generously. 

'"Even  so,  I  hate  to  see  you  cheated,'  says  his 
father  kindly.  'I  hate  to  have  you  pay  unjust  ex 
tortions  out  of  the  mere  pittance  your  tight-fisted  old 
father  allows  you.' 


162  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"Young  Angus  said  nothing  to  this,  but  blushed 
and  coughed  uncomfortably. 

"  'If  you  hurt  that  hotel  anything  like  twenty-three 
hundred  dollars'  worth,  it  must  be  an  interesting 
sight/  his  father  goes  on  brightly. 

"'Oh,  it  was  funny  at  the  time,'  says  Angus  boy, 
cheering  up  again. 

' "Things  often  are,'  says  old  Angus.  Til  have  a 
look.' 

" 'At  the  bill?' 

"'No,  at  the  wreck,'  says  he.  The  old  boy  was 
still  quiet  on  the  outside,  but  was  plainly  under 
great  excitement,  for  he  now  folded  his  napkin  with 
care,  a  crime  of  which  I  knew  Ellabelle  had  broken 
him  the  first  week  in  New  York,  years  before.  I 
noticed  their  butler  had  the  fine  feeling  to  look 
steadily  away  at  the  wall  during  this  obscenity. 
The  offender  then  made  a  pleasant  remark  about  the 
beauty  of  the  day  and  left  the  palatial  apartment 
swiftly.  Young  Angus  and  his  mother  looked  at 
each  other  and  strolled  after  him  softly  over  rugs 
costing  about  eighty  thousand  dollars.  The  hus 
band  and  father  was  being  driven  off  by  a  man  he 
could  trust  in  a  car  they  had  let  him  have  for  his 
own  use.  Later  Ellabelle  confides  to  me  that  she 
mistrusts  old  Angus  is  contemplating  some  bit  of  his 
national  deviltry.  'He  had  a  strange  look  on  his 
face,'  says  she,  'and  you  know — once  a  Scotchman, 
always  a  Scotchman!  Oh,  it  would  be  pitiful  if  he 
did  anything  peculiarly  Scotch  just  at  our  most  crit- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  163 

ical  period  here!'  Then  she  felt  of  her  face  to  see 
if  there  was  any  nervous  lines  come  into  it,  and  there 
was,  and  she  beat  it  for  the  maid  to  have  'em  rubbed 
out  ere  they  set. 

"Yet  at  dinner  that  night  everything  seemed  fine, 
with  old  Angus  as  jovial  as  I'd  ever  seen  him,  and  the 
meal  come  to  a  cheerful  end  and  we  was  having  coffee 
in  the  Looey  de  Medisee  saloon,  I  think  it  is,  before  a 
word  was  said  about  this  here  injured  hotel. 

"'You  were  far  too  modest  this  morning,  you  sly 
dog!'  says  Angus,  peer,  at  last,  chuckling  delightedly. 
'You  misled  me  grievously.  That  job  of  wrecking 
shows  genius  of  a  quality  that  was  all  too  rare  in  my 
time.  I  suspect  it's  the  college  that  does  it.  I 
shouldn't  wonder  now  if  going  through  college  is  as 
good  as  a  liberal  education.  I  don't  believe  mere 
uneducated  house-wreckers  could  have  done  so 
pretty  a  job  in  twice  the  time,  and  there's  clever 
little  touches  they  never  would  have  thought  of  at 
all.' 

"'It  did  look  thorough  when  we  left,'  says  young 
Angus,  not  quite  knowing  whether  to  laugh. 

"'It's  nothing  short  of  sublime,'  says  his  father 
proudly.  'I  stood  in  that  deserted  banquet  hall, 
though  it  looks  never  a  bit  like  one,  with  ruin  and 
desolation  on  every  hand  as  far  as  the  eye  could  reach. 
It  inspired  such  awe  in  the  bereaved  owner  and 
me  that  we  instinctively  spoke  in  hushed  whispers. 
I've  had  no  such  gripping  sensation  as  that  since  I 
gazed  upon  the  dead  city  of  Pompeii.  No  longer  can 


164  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

it  be  said  that  Europe  possesses  all  the  impressive 
ruins.' 

"Angus  boy  grinned  cheerfully  now,  feeling  that 
this  tribute  was  heartfelt. 

"'I  suspect  now/  goes  on  the  old  boy,  'that  when 
the  wreckage  is  cleared  away  we  shall  find  the  man 
gled  bodies  of  several  that  perished  when  the  bolts 
descended  from  a  clear  sky  upon  the  gay  scene.' 

"  'Perhaps  under  the  tables,'  says  young  Angus, 
chirking  up  still  more  at  this  geniality.  'Two  or 
three  went  down  early  and  may  still  be  there.' 

'"Yet  twenty-three  hundred  for  it  is  a  monstrous 
outrage,'  says  the  old  man,  changing  his  voice  just  a 
mite.  'Too  well  I  know  the  cost  of  such  repairs. 
Fifteen  hundred  at  most  would  make  the  place  better 
than  ever — and  to  think  that  you,  struggling  along 
to  keep  up  appearances  on  the  little  I  give  you,  should 
be  imposed  upon  by  a  crook  that  undoubtedly  has 
the  law  on  his  side!  I  could  endure  no  thought  of  it, 
so  I  foiled  him.' 

"'How?'  says  young  Angus,  kind  of  alarmed. 

"Angus,  peer,  yawned  and  got  up.  'It's  a  long 
story  and  would  hardly  interest  you,'  says  he,  moving 
over  to  the  door.  'Besides,  I  must  be  to  bed  against 
the  morrow,  which  will  be  a  long,  hard  day  for  me.' 
His  voice  had  tightened  up. 

'"What  have  you  done?'  demands  Ellabelle  pas 
sionately. 

'"Saved  your  son  eight  hundred  dollars,'  says 
Angus,  'or  the  equivalent  of  his  own  earnings  for 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  165 

something  like  eight  hundred  years  at  current  prices 
for  labour.' 

"  'I've  a  right  to  know,'  says  Ellabelle  through  her 
teeth  and  stiffening  in  her  chair.  Young  Angus  just 
set  there  with  his  mouth  open. 

"  'So  you  have,'  says  old  Angus,  and  he  goes  on  as 
crisp  as  a  bunch  of  celery:  'I  told  you  I  felt  ingenious. 
I've  kept  this  money  in  the  family  by  the  simple  de 
vice  of  taking  the  job.  I've  engaged  two  other 
painters  and  decorators  besides  myself,  a  carpenter, 
an  electrician,  a  glazier,  and  a  few  proletariats  of 
minor  talent  for  clearing  away  the  wreckage.  I  shall 
be  on  the  job  at  eight.  The  loafers  won't  start  at 
seven,  as  I  used  to.  Don't  think  I'd  see  any  son  of 
mine  robbed  before  my  very  eyes.  My  new  overalls 
are  laid  out  and  my  valet  has  instructions  to  get  me 
into  them  at  seven,  though  he  persists  in  believing 
I'm  to  attend  a  fancy-dress  ball  at  some  strangely 
fashionable  hour.  So  I  bid  you  all  good  even 
ing.' 

"Well,  I  guess  that  was  the  first  time  Ellabelle  had 
really  let  go  of  herself  since  she  was  four  years  old  or 
thereabouts.  Talk  about  the  empress  of  stormy 
emotion!  For  ten  minutes  the  room  sounded  like 
a  torture  chamber  of  the  dark  Middle  Ages.  But 
the  doctor  reached  there  at  last  in  a  swift  car,  and 
him  and  the  two  maids  managed  to  get  her  laid  out 
all  comfortable  and  moaning,  though  still  with  out 
breaks  about  every  twenty  minutes  that  I  could  hear 
clear  over  on  my  side  of  the  house. 


166  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"And  down  below  my  window  on  the  marble 
porch  Angus,  fills,  was  walking  swiftly  up  and  down 
for  about  one  hour.  He  made  no  speech  like  the 
night  before.  He  just  walked  and  walked.  •  The 
part  that  struck  me  was  that  neither  of  them  had 
ever  seemed  to  have  the  slightest  notion  of  pleading 
old  Angus  out  of  his  mad  folly.  They  both  seemed 
to  know  the  Scotch  when  it  did  break  out. 

"At  seven-thirty  the  next  morning  the  old  boy  in 
overalls  and  jumper  and  a  cap  was  driven  to  his  job 
in  a  car  as  big  as  an  apartment  house.  The  curtains 
to  Ellabelle's  Looey  Seez  boudoir  remained  drawn, 
with  hourly  bulletins  from  the  two  Swiss  maids  that 
she  was  passing  away  in  great  agony.  Angus,  Junior, 
was  off  early,  too,  in  his  snakiest  car.  A  few  minutes 
later  they  got  a  telephone  from  him  sixty  miles  away 
that  he  would  not  be  home  to  lunch.  Old  Angus 
had  taken  his  own  lunch  with  him  in  a  tin  pail  he'd 
bought  the  day  before,  with  a  little  cupola  on  top  for 
the  cup  to  put  the  bottle  of  cold  coffee  in. 

"It  was  a  joyous  home  that  day,  if  you  don't  care 
how  you  talk.  All  it  needed  was  a  crepe  necktie 
on  the  knob  of  the  front  door.  That  ornery  old 
hound,  Angus,  got  in  from  his  work  at  six,  spotty 
with  paint  and  smelling  of  oil  and  turpentine,  but 
cheerful  as  a  new  father.  He  washed  up,  ridding 
himself  of  at  least  a  third  of  the  paint  smell,  looked 
in  at  Ellabelle's  door  to  say,  'What!  Not  feeling 
well,  mamma?  Now,  that's  too  bad!'  ate  a  hearty 
dinner  with  me,  young  Angus  not  having  been  heard 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  167 

from  further,  and  fell  asleep  in  a  gold  armchair  at 
ten  minutes  past  nine. 

"He  was  off  again  next  morning.  Ellabelle's 
health  was  still  breaking  down,  but  young  Angus 
sneaked  in  and  partook  of  a  meagre  lunch  with  me. 
He  was  highly  vexed  with  his  pa.  'He's  nothing 
but  a  scoundrelly  old  liar,'  he  says  to  me,  'saying 
that  he  gives  me  but  a  pittance.  He's  always  given 
me  a  whale  of  an  allowance.  Why,  actually,  I've 
more  than  once  had  money  left  over  at  the  end  of  the 
quarter.  And  now  his  talk  about  saving  money !  I 
tell  you  he  has  some  other  reason  than  money  for 
breaking  the  mater's  heart.'  The  boy  looked  very 
shrewd  as  he  said  this. 

"That  night  at  quitting  time  he  was  strangely 
down  at  the  place  with  his  own  car  to  fetch  his  father 
home.  'I'll  trust  you  this  once,'  says  the  old  man, 
getting  in  and  looking  more  then  ever  like  a  dissolute 
working  man.  On  the  way  they  passed  this  here 
yellow-haired  daughter  of  the  old  train-robber  that 
there  had  been  talk  of  the  boy  making  a  match  with. 
She  was  driving  her  own  car  and  looked  neither  to 
right  nor  left. 

'"Not  speaking?'  says  old  Angus. 

"  'She  didn't  see  us,'  says  the  boy. 

"  'She's  ashamed  of  your  father,'  says  the  old  man. 

"'She's  not,'  says  the  boy. 

"  'You  know  it,'  says  the  old  scoundrel. 

"  'I'll  show  her,'  says  his  son. 

"Well,   we  had   another   cheerful   evening,   with 


168  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Ellabelle  sending  word  to  old  Angus  that  she  wanted 
me  to  have  the  necklace  of  brilliants  with  the  sap 
phire  pendant,  and  the  two  faithful  maids  was  to  get 
suitable  keepsakes  out  of  the  rest  of  her  jewels,  and 
would  her  son  always  wear  the  seal  ring  with  her 
hair  in  it  that  she  had  given  him  when  he  was  twenty? 
And  the  old  devil  started  in  to  tell  how  much  he  could 
have  saved  by  taking  charge  of  the  work  in  his  own 
house,  and  how  a  union  man  nowadays  would  do  just 
enough  to  keep  within  the  law,  and  so  on;  but  he  got 
to  yawning  his  head  off  and  retired  at  nine,  complain 
ing  that  his  valet  that  morning  had  cleaned  and 
pressed  his  overalls.  Young  Angus  looked  very 
shrewd  at  me  and  again  says:  'The  old  liar!  He 
has  some  other  reason  than  money.  He  can't  fool 
me.' 

"I  kind  of  gathered  from  both  of  them  the  truth 
of  what  happened  the  next  day.  Young  Angus 
himself  showed  up  at  the  job  about  nine  A.  M.,  with 
a  bundle  under  his  arm.  'Where's  the  old  man?' 
his  father  heard  him  demand  of  the  carpenter,  he 
usually  speaking  of  old  Angus  as  the  governor. 

"'Here/  says  he  from  the  top  of  a  stepladder  in 
the  entry  which  looked  as  if  a  glacier  had  passed 
through  it. 

'"Could  you  put  me  to  work?'  says  the  boy. 

"  'Don't  get  me  to  shaking  with  laughter  up  here,' 
says  the  old  brute.  '  Can't  you  see  I'd  be  in  peril  of 
falling  off?' 

"Young  Angus   undoes  his  bundle  and  reveals 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  169 

overalls  and  a  jumper  which  he  gets  into  quickly. 
'What  do  I  do  first?'  says  he. 

"His  father  went  on  kalsomining  and  took  never 
a  look  at  him  more.  'The  time  has  largely  passed 
here,'  says  he,  'for  men  that  haven't  learned  to  do 
something,  but  you  might  take  some  of  the  burnt 
umber  there  and  work  it  well  into  a  big  gob  of  that 
putty  till  it's  brown  enough  to  match  the  woodwork. 
Should  you  display  the  least  talent  for  that  we  may 
see  later  if  you've  any  knack  with  a  putty  knife.' 

"The  new  hand  had  brought  no  lunch  with  him, 
but  his  father  spared  him  a  few  scraps  from  his  own, 
and  they  all  swigged  beer  from  a  pail  of  it  they  sent 
out  for.  So  the  scandal  was  now  complete  in  all  its 
details.  The  palatial  dining-room  that  night,  being 
a  copy  of  a  good  church  or  something  from  ancient 
Italy,  smelled  like  a  paint  shop  indeed — and  sounded 
like  one  through  dinner.  'That  woodwork  will  be 
fit  to  second-coat  first  thing  in  the  morning,'  says  old 
Angus.  'I'll  have  it  sandpapered  in  no  time,'  says 
the  boy.  'Your  sandpapering  ain't  bad,'  says  the 
other, '  though  you  have  next  to  no  skill  with  a  brush.' 
4 1  thought  I  was  pretty  good  with  that  flat  one 
though.'  'Oh,  fair;  just  fair!  First-coating  needs 
little  finesse.  There !  I  forgot  to  order  more  rubbing 
varnish.  Maybe  the  men  will  think  of  it.'  And  so 
on  till  they  both  yawned  themselves  off  to  their 
Scotch  Renaysence  apartments.  Ellabelle  had  not 
yet  learned  the  worst.  It  seemed  to  be  felt  that  she 
had  a  right  to  perish  without  suffering  the  added 


170  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

ignominy  of  knowing  her  son  was  acting  like  a  com 
mon  wage  slave. 

"They  was  both  on  the  job  next  day.  Of  course 
the  disgraceful  affair  had  by  now  penetrated  to 
the  remotest  outlying  marble  shack.  Several  male 
millionaires  this  day  appeared  on  the  scene  to  josh 
Angus,  peer,  and  Angus,  fills,  as  they  toiled  at  their 
degrading  tasks.  Not  much  attention  was  paid  to 
'em,  it  appears,  not  even  to  the  old  train-robber  who 
come  to  jest  and  remained  to  cross-examine  Angus 
about  how  much  he  was  really  going  to  clear  on  the 
job,  seriously  now.  Anything  like  that  was  bound 
to  fascinate  the  old  crook. 

"And  next  day,  close  to  quitting  time,  what  hap 
pens  but  this  here  robber  chieftain's  petted  daughter 
coming  in  and  hanging  round  and  begging  to  be  let 
to  help  because  it  was  such  jolly  fun.  I  believe  she 
did  get  hold  of  a  square  of  sandpaper  with  which  she 
daintily  tried  to  remove  some  fresh  varnish  that 
should  have  been  let  strictly  alone;  and  when  they 
both  ordered  her  out  in  a  frenzy  of  rage,  what  does 
she  do  but  wait  for  'em  with  her  car  which  she  made 
them  enter  and  drove  them  to  their  abode  like  they 
belonged  to  the  better  class  of  people  that  one  would 
care  to  know.  The  two  fools  was  both  kind  of  ex 
cited  about  this  that  night. 

"The  next  day  she  breezes  in  again  and  tries  to 
get  them  to  knock  off  an  hour  early  so  she  can  take 
them  to  the  country  club  for  tea,  but  they  refuse 
this,  so  she  makes  little  putty  statues  of  them  both 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  171 

and  drove  a  few  nails  where  they  would  do  no  good 
and  upset  a  bucket  of  paste  and  leaned  a  two-hundred- 
dollar  lace  thing  against  a  varnished  wall  to  the  detri 
ment  of  both,  and  fell  off  a  stepladder.  Old  Angus 
caught  her  and  boxed  her  ears  soundly.  And  again 
she  drove  them  through  the  avenues  of  a  colony  of 
fine  old  families  with  money  a  little  bit  older,  by  a 
few  days,  and  up  the  drive  to  their  own  door. 

"Ellabelle  was  peeking  between  the  plush  curtains 
on  this  occasion,  for  some  heartless  busybody  during 
the  day  had  told  her  that  her  son  and  husband 
was  both  renegades  now.  And  strangely  enough,  she 
begun  to  get  back  her  strength  from  that  very  mo 
ment — seeing  that  exclusive  and  well-known  young 
debby-tant  consorting  in  public  with  the  reprobates. 
I'm  darned  if  she  didn't  have  the  genius  after  that  to 
treat  the  whole  thing  as  a  practical  joke,  especially 
when  she  finds  out  that  none  of  them  exclusives  had 
had  it  long  enough  to  look  down  on  another  million 
aire  merely  for  pinching  a  penny  now  and  then.  Old 
Angus  as  a  matter  of  fact  had  become  just  a  little 
more  important  than  she  had  ever  been  and  could 
have  snubbed  any  one  he  wanted  to.  The  only 
single  one  in  the  whole  place  that  throwed  him  down 
was  his  own  English  valet.  He  was  found  helpless 
drunk  in  a  greenhouse  the  third  day,  having  ruined 
nine  thousand  dollars'  worth  of  orchids  he'd  gone  to 
sleep  amongst,  and  he  resigned  his  position  with  bitter 
dignity  the  moment  he  recovered  consciousness. 

"Moreover,  young  Angus  and  this  girl  clenched 


172  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

without  further  opposition.  Her  train-robber  father 
said  the  boy  must  have  something  in  him  even  if  he 
didn't  look  it,  and  old  Angus  said  he  still  believed  the 
girl  to  be  nothing  but  a  yellow-haired  soubrette; 
but  what  should  we  expect  of  a  woman,  after  all? 

"The  night  the  job  was  finished  we  had  the  j oiliest 
dinner  of  my  visit,  with  a  whole  gang  of  exclusive- 
setters  at  the  groaning  board,  including  this  girl  and 
her  folks,  and  champagne,  of  which  Angus,  peer,  con 
sumed  near  one  of  the  cut-glass  vases  full. 

"I  caught  him  with  young  Angus  in  the  deserted 
library  later,  while  the  rest  was  one-stepping  in  the 
Henry  Quatter  ballroom  or  dance  hall.  The  old 
man  had  his  arms  pretty  well  upon  the  boy's  shoul 
ders.  Yes,  sir,  he  was  almost  actually  hugging 
him.  The  boy  fled  to  this  gilded  cafe  where  the  rest 
was,  and  old  Angus,  with  his  eyes  shining  very  queer, 
he  grabs  me  by  the  arm  and  says,  *  Once  when  he  was 
very  small — though  unusually  large  for  his  age 
of  three,  mind  you — he  had  a  way  of  scratching  my 
face  something  painful  with  his  little  nails,  and  all  in 
laughing  play,  you  know.  I  tried  to  warn  him, 
but  he  couldn't  understand,  of  course;  so,  not  know 
ing  how  else  to  instruct  him,  I  scratched  back  one 
day,  laughing  myself  like  he  was,  but  sinking  my  nails 
right  fierce  into  the  back  of  his  little  fat  neck.  He 
relaxed  the  tension  in  his  own  fingers.  He  was  hurt, 
for  the  tears  started,  but  he  never  cried.  He  just 
looked  puzzled  and  kept  on  laughing,  being  bright 
to  see  I  could  play  the  game,  too.  Only  he  saw  it 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  173 

wasn't  so  good  a  game  as  he'd  thought.  I  wonder 
what  made  me  think  of  that,  now!  I  don't  know. 
Come — from  yonder  doorway  we  can  see  him  as  he 
dances.' 

"And  Ellabelle  was  saying  gently  to  one  and  all, 
with  her  merry  peal  of  laughter,  'Ah,  yes — once  a 
Scotchman,  always ' 

"My  land!  It's  ten  o'clock.  Don't  them  little 
white-faced  beauties  make  the  music!  Honestly 
I'd  like  to  have  a  cot  out  in  the  corral.  We  miss  a 
lot  of  it  in  here." 


V 
NON  PLUSH  ULTRA 

SUNDAY  and  a  driving  rain  had  combined  to 
keep  Ma  Pettengill  within  the  Arrowhead 
ranch  house.  Neither  could  have  done  this 
alone.  The  rain  would  merely  have  added  a  slicker 
to  her  business  costume  of  khaki  riding  breeches, 
laced  boots,  and  flannel  shirt  as  she  rode  abroad; 
while  a  clement  Sabbath  would  have  seen  her  "rest 
ing,"  as  she  would  put  it,  in  and  round  the  various 
outbuildings,  feeding-pens,  blacksmith  shop,  harness- 
room,  branding-chute,  or  what  not,  issuing  orders  to 
attentive  henchmen  from  time  to  time;  diagnosing 
the  gray  mule's  barbed- wire  cut;  compounding  a 
tonic  for  Adolph,  the  big  milk-strain  Durham  bull, 
who  has  been  ailing;  wishing  to  be  told  why  in  some 
thing  the  water  hadn't  been  turned  into  that  south 
ditch;  and,  like  a  competent  general,  disposing  her 
forces  and  munitions  for  the  campaign  of  the  coming 
week.  But  Sunday — and  a  wildly  rainy  Sunday — 
had  housed  her  utterly. 

Being  one  who  can  idle  with  no  grace  whatever  she 
was  engaged  in  what  she  called  putting  the  place  to 
rights.  This  meant  taking  out  the  contents  of 
bureau  drawers  and  wardrobes  and  putting  them  back 

174 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  175 

again,  massing  the  litter  on  the  big  table  in  the  living- 
room  into  an  involved  geometry  of  neat  piles  that 
would  endure  for  all  of  an  hour,  straightening  pic 
tures  on  the  walls,  eliminating  the  home-circles  of 
spiders  long  unmolested,  loudly  calling  upon  Lew 
Wee,  the  Chinaman,  who  affrightedly  fled  farther  and 
farther  after  each  call,  and  ever  and  again  booming 
pained  surmises  through  the  house  as  to  what  fearful 
state  it  would  get  to  be  in  if  she  didn't  fight  it  to  a 
clean  finish  once  in  a  dog's  age. 

The  woman  dumped  a  wastebasket  of  varied  rub 
bish  into  the  open  fire,  leaned  a  broom  against  the 
mantel,  readjusted  the  towel  that  protected  her  gray 
hair  from  the  dust — hair  on  week  days  exposed  with 
never  a  qualm  to  all  manner  of  dust — cursed  all 
Chinamen  on  land  or  sea  with  an  especial  and  piquant 
blight  invoked  upon  the  one  now  in  hiding,  then  took 
from  the  back  of  a  chair  where  she  had  hung  it  the 
moment  before  a  riding  skirt  come  to  feebleness  and 
decrepitude.  She  held  it  up  before  critical  eyes  as 
one  scanning  the  morning  paper  for  headlines  of 
significance. 

"Ruined!"  she  murmured.  Even  her  murmur 
must  have  reached  Lew  Wee,  how  remote  soever  his 
isle  of  safety.  "Worn  one  time  and  all  ruined  up! 
That's  what  happens  for  trying  to  get  something  for 
nothing.  You'd  think  women  would  learn.  You 
would  if  you  didn't  know  a  few.  Hetty  Daggett,  her 
that  was  Hetty  Tipton,  orders  this  by  catalogue,  No. 
3456  or  something,  from  the  mail-order  house  in 


176  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Chicago.  I  was  down  in  Red  Gap  when  it  come. 
'  Isn't  it  simply  wonderful  what  you  can  get  for  three 
thirty-eight!'  says  she  with  gleaming  eyes,  laying 
this  thing  out  before  me.  'I  don't  see  how  they  can 
ever  do  it  for  the  money.'  She  found  out  the  next 
day  when  she  rode  up  here  in  it  with  me  and  Mr. 
Burchell  Daggett,  her  husband.  Nothing  but  ruin! 
Seams  all  busted,  sleazy  cloth  wore  through.  But 
Hetty  just  looks  it  over  cheerfully  and  says:  'Oh, 
well,  what  can  you  expect  for  three  thirty-eight?'  Is 
that  like  a  woman  or  is  it  like  something  science  has 
not  yet  discovered? 

"That  Hetty  child  is  sure  one  woman.  This  skirt 
would  never  have  held  together  to  ride  back  in,  so  she 
goes  down  as  far  as  the  narrow  gauge  in  the  wagon 
with  Buck  Devine,  wearing  a  charming  afternoon 
frock  of  pale  blue  charmeuse  rather  than  get  into  a 
pair  of  my  khakis  and  ride  back  with  her  own  lawful- 
wedded  husband;  yes,  sir;  married  to  him  safe  as 
anything,  but  wouldn't  forget  her  womanhood.  Only 
once  did  she  ever  come  near  it.  I  saved  her  then  be 
cause  she  hadn't  snared  Mr.  Burchell  Daggett  yet, 
and  of  course  a  girl  has  to  be  a  little  careful.  And 
she  took  my  counsels  so  much  to  heart  she's  been 
careful  ever  since.  'Why,  I  should  simply  die  of 
mortification  if  my  dear  mate  were  to  witness  me 
in  those,'  says  she  when  I'm  telling  her  to  take 
a  chance  for  once  and  get  into  these  here  riding 
pants  of  mine  because  it  would  be  uncomfortable 
going  down  in  that  wagon.  'But  what  is  my  com- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  177 

fort  compared  to  dear  Burchell's  peace  of  mind?' 
says  she. 

"Ain't  we  the  goods,  though,  when  we  do  once 
learn  a  thing?  Of  course  most  of  us  don't  have  to 
learn  stuff  like  this.  Born  in  us.  I  shouldn't  won 
der  if  they  was  something  in  the  talk  of  this  man 
Shaw  or  Shavian — I  see  the  name  spelled  both  ways 
in  the  papers.  I  can't  read  his  pieces  myself  because 
he  rasps  me,  being  not  only  a  smarty  but  a  vegetarian. 
I  don't  know.  I  might  stand  one  or  the  other  pure 
bred,  but  the  cross  seems  to  bring  out  the  worst 
strain  in  both.  I  once  got  a  line  on  his  beliefs  and 
customs  though — like  it  appears  he  don't  believe 
anything  ought  to  be  done  for  its  own  sake  but  only 
for  some  good  purpose.  It  was  one  day  I  got  caught 
at  a  meeting  of  the  Onward  and  Upward  Club  .in  Re/1 
Gap  and  Mrs.  Alonzo  Price  read  a  paper  about  his 
meaning.  I  hope  she  didn't  wrong  him.  I  hope  she 
was  justified  in  all  she  said  he  really  means  in  his 
secret  heart.  No  one  ought  to  talk  that  way  about 
any  one  if  they  ain't  got  the  goods  on  'em.  One 
thing  I  might  have  listened  to  with  some  patience  if 
the  man  et  steaks  and  talked  more  like  some  one 
you'd  care  to  have  in  your  own  home.  In  fact,  I 
listened  to  it  anyway.  Maybe  he  took  it  from  some 
book  he  read — about  woman  and  her  true  nature. 
According  to  Henrietta  Templeton  Price,  as  near  as 
I  could  get  her,  this  Shaw  or  Shavian  believes  that 
women  is  merely  a  flock  of  men-hawks  circling  above 
the  herd  till  they  see  a  nice  fat  little  laf  ib  of  a  man, 


178          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

then  one  fell  swoop  and  all  is  over  but  the  screams  of 
the  victim  dying  out  horribly.  They  bear  him  off  to 
their  nest  in  a  blasted  pine  and  pick  the  meat  from  his 
bones  at  leisure.  Of  course  that  ain't  the  way  ladies 
was  spoken  of  in  the  Aunt  Patty  Little  Helper  Series 
I  got  out  of  the  Presbyterian  Sabbath-school  library 
back  in  Fredonia,  New  York,  when  I  was  thirteen — 
and  yet — and  yet — as  they  say  on  the  stage  in  these 
plays  of  high  or  English  life/' 

It  sounded  promising  enough,  and  the  dust  had 
now  settled  so  that  I  could  dimly  make  out  the  noble 
lines  of  my  hostess.  I  begged  for  more. 

"Well,  go  on — Mrs.  Burchell  Daggett  once  nearly 
forgot  her  womanhood.  Certainly,  go  on,  if  it's  any 
thing  that  would  be  told  outside  of  a  smoking-car." 

The  lady  grinned. 

"Many  of  us  has  forgot  our  womanhood  in  the 
dear,  dead  past,"  she  confessed.  "Me?  Sure! 
Where's  that  photo  album.  Where  did  I  put  that 
album  anyway?  That's  the  way  in  this  house.  Get 
things  straightened  up  once,  you  can't  find  a  single 
one  you  want.  Look  where  I  put  it  now!"  She 
demolished  an  obelisk  of  books  on  the  table,  one  she 
had  lately  constructed  with  some  pains,  and  brought 
the  album  that  had  been  its  pedestal.  "Get  me 
there,  do  you?" 

It  was  the  photograph  of  a  handsome  young  woman 
in  the  voluminous  riding  skirt  of  years  gone  by,  before 
the  side-saddle  became  extinct.  She  held  a  crop  and 
wore  an  astoundingly  plumed  bonnet.  Despite  the 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  179 

offensive  disguise,  one  saw  provocation  for  the  course 
adopted  by  the  late  Lysander  John  Pettengill  at 
about  that  period. 

"Very  well — now  get  me  here,  after  I'd  been  on  the 
ranch  only  a  month."  It  was  the  same  young 
woman  in  the  not  too  foppish  garb  of  a  cowboy.  In 
wide-brimmed  hat,  flannel  shirt,  woolly  chaps,,  quirt 
in  hand,  she  bestrode  a  horse  that  looked  capable  and 
daring. 

"Yes,  sir,  I  hadn't  been  here  only  a  month  when  I 
forgot  my  womanhood  like  that.  Gee !  How  good  it 
felt  to  get  into  'em  and  banish  that  sideshow  tent  of  a 
skirt.  I'd  never  known  a  free  moment  before  and  I 
blessed  Lysander  John  for  putting  me  up  to  it.  Then, 
proud  as  Punch,  what  do  I  do  but  send  one  of  these 
photos  back  to  dear  old  Aunt  Waitstill,  in  Fredonia, 
thinking  she  would  rejoice  at  the  wild,  free  life  I  was 
now  leading  in  the  Far  West.  And  what  do  I  get  for  it 
but  a  tear-spotted  letter  of  eighteen  pages,  with  a 
side-kick  from  her  pastor,  the  Reverend  Abner 
Hemingway,  saying  he  wishes  to  indorse  every  word 
of  Sister  Baxter's  appeal  to  me — asking  why  do  I 
parade  myself  shamelessly  in  this  garb  of  a  fallen 
woman,  and  can  nothing  be  said  to  recall  me  to  the 
true  nobility  that  must  still  be  in  my  nature  but  which 
I  am  forgetting  in  these  licentious  habiliments,  and 
so  on!  The  picture  had  been  burned  after  giving 
the  Reverend  his  own  horrified  flash  of  it,  and  they 
would  both  pray  daily  that  I  might  get  up  out  of  this 
degradation  and  be  once  more  a  good,  true  woman 


180          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

that  some  pure  little  child  would  not  be  ashamed  to 
call  the  sacred  name  of  mother. 

"Such  was  Aunt  Waitstill — what  names  them  poor 
old  girls  had  to  stand  for!  I  had  another  aunt 
named  Obedience,  only  she  proved  to  be  a  regular 
cinch-binder.  Her  name  was  never  mentioned  in  the 
family  after  she  slid  down  a  rainspout  one  night  and 
eloped  to  marry  a  depraved  scoundrel  who  drove 
through  there  on  a  red  wagon  with  tinware  inside  that 
he  would  trade  for  old  rags.  I'm  just  telling  you 
how  times  have  changed  in  spite  of  the  best  efforts  of 
a  sanctified  ministry.  I  cried  over  that  letter  at  first. 
Then  I  showed  it  to  Lysander  John,  who  said  'Oh, 
hell!'  being  a  man  of  few  words,  so  I  felt  better  and 
went  right  on  forgetting  my  womanhood  in  that 
shameless  garb  of  a  so-and-so — though  where  aunty 
had  got  her  ideas  of  such  I  never  could  make  out — 
and  it  got  to  be  so  much  a  matter  of  course  and  I 
had  so  many  things  to  think  of  besides  my  woman 
hood  that  I  plumb  forgot  the  whole  thing  until  this 
social  upheaval  in  Red  Gap  a  few  years  ago. 

"I  got  to  tell  you  that  the  wild  and  lawless  West,  in 
all  matters  relating  to  proper  dress  for  ladies,  is  the 
most  conservative  and  hidebound  section  of  our  great 
land  of  the  free  and  home  of  the  brave — if  you  can  get 
by  with  it.  Out  here  the  women  see  by  the  Sunday 
papers  that  it's  being  wore  that  way  publicly  in  New 
York  and  no  one  arrested  for  it,  but  they  don't  hardly 
believe  it  at  that,  and  they  wouldn't  show  themselves 
in  one,  not  if  you  begged  them  to  on  your  bended 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  181 

knees,  and  what  is  society  coming  to  anyway?  You 
might  as  well  dress  like  one  of  them  barefooted 
dancers,  only  calling  'em  barefooted  must  be  meant 
like  sarcasm — and  they'd  die  before  they'd  let  a 
daughter  of  theirs  make  a  show  of  herself  like  that  for 
odious  beasts  of  men  to  leer  at,  and  so  on — until  a 
couple  years  later  Mrs.  Henrietta  Templeton  Price 
gets  a  regular  one  and  wears  it  down  Main  Street,  and 
nothing  objectionable  happens;  so  then  they  all 
hustle  to  get  one — not  quite  so  extreme,  of  course,  but 
after  all,  why  not,  since  only  the  evil-minded  could 
criticise?  Pretty  soon  they're  all  wearing  it  exactly 
like  New  York  did  two  years  ago,  with  mebbe  the 
limit  raised  a  bit  here  and  there  by  some  one  who 
makes  her  own.  But  again  they're  saying  that  the 
latest  one  New  York  is  wearing  is  so  bad  that  it  must 
be  confined  to  a  certain  class  of  women,  even  if  they 
do  get  taken  from  left  to  right  at  Asbury  Park  and 
Newport  and  other  colonies  of  wealth  and  fashion,  be 
cause  the  vilest  dregs  can  go  there  if  they  have  the 
price,  which  they  often  do. 

"Red  Gap  is  like  that.  With  me  out  here  on  the 
ranch  it  didn't  matter  what  I  wore  because  it  was 
mostly  only  men  that  saw  me;  but  I  can  well  remember 
the  social  upheaval  when  our  smartest  young  matrons 
and  well-known  society  belles  flung  modesty  to  the 
chinook  wind  and  took  to  divided  skirts  for  horse 
back  riding.  My,  the  brazen  hussies!  It  ain't  so 
many  years  ago.  Up  to  that  time  any  female  over 
the  age  of  nine  caught  riding  a  horse  cross-saddle 


182          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

would  have  lost  her  character  good  and  quick.  And 
these  pioneers  lost  any  of  theirs  that  wasn't  cemented 
good  and  hard  with  proved  respectability.  I  re 
member  hearing  Jeff  Tuttle  tell  what  he'd  do  to  any 
of  his  womenfolks  that  so  far  forgot  the  sacred  names 
of  home  and  mother.  It  was  startling  enough,  but 
Jeff  somehow  never  done  it.  And  if  he  was  to  hear 
Addie  or  one  of  the  girls  talking  about  a  side-saddle 
to-day  he'd  think  she  was  nutty  or  mebbe  wanting 
one  for  the  state  museum.  So  it  goes  with  us.  My 
hunch  is  that  so  it  will  ever  go. 

"The  years  passed,  and  that  thrill  of  viciousness  at 
wearing  divided  skirts  in  public  got  all  rubbed  off — 
that  thrill  that  every  last  one  of  us  adores  to  feel  if 
only  it  don't  get  her  talked  about — too  much — by 
evil-minded  gossips.  Then  comes  this  here  next  up 
heaval  over  riding  pants  for  ladies — or  them  that  set 
themselves  up  to  be  such.  Of  course  we'd  long 
known  that  the  things  were  worn  in  New  York  and 
even  in  such  modern  Babylons  as  Spokane  and 
Seattle;  but  no  woman  in  Red  Gap  had  ever  forgot 
she  had  a  position  to  keep  up,  until  summer  before 
last,  when  we  saw  just  how  low  one  of  our  sex  could 
fall,  right  out  on  the  public  street. 

"She  was  the  wife  of  a  botanist  from  some  Eastern 
college  and  him  and  her  rode  a  good  bit  and  dressed 
just  alike  in  khaki  things.  My,  the  infamies  that 
was  intimated  about  that  poor  creature!  She  was 
bony  and  had  plainly  seen  forty,  very  severe-featured, 
with  scraggly  hair  and  a  sharp  nose  and  spectacles, 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  183 

and  looked  as  if  she  had  never  had  a  moment  of  the 
most  innocent  pleasure  in  all  her  life;  but  them  riding 
pants  fixed  her  good  in  the  minds  of  our  lady  porch- 
knockers.  And  the  men  just  as  bad,  though  they 
could  hardly  bear  to  look  twice  at  her,  she  was  that 
discouraging  to  the  eye;  they  agreed  with  their  wives 
that  she  must  be  one  of  that  sort. 

"But  things  seem  to  pile  up  all  at  once  in  our  town. 
That  very  summer  the  fashion  magazines  was  handed 
round  with  pages  turned  down  at  the  more  daring 
spots  where  ladies  were  shown  in  such  things.  It 
wasn't  felt  that  they  were  anything  for  the  little  ones 
to  see.  But  still,  after  all,  wasn't  it  sensible,  now 
really,  when  you  come  right  down  to  it?  and  as  a 
matter  of  fact  isn't  a  modest  woman  modest  in  any 
thing? — it  isn't  what  she  wears  but  how  she  conducts 
herself  in  public,  or  don't  you  think  so,  Mrs.  Ballard? 
— and  you  might  as  well  be  dead  as  out  of  style,  and 
would  Lehman,  the  Square  Tailor,  be  able  to  make  up 
anything  like  that  one  there? — but  no,  because  how 
would  he  get  your  measure? — and  surely  no  modest 
woman  could  give  him  hers  even  if  she  did  take  it  her 
self — anyway,  you'd  be  insulted  by  all  the  street 
rowdies  as  you  rode  by,  to  say  nothing  of  being  ogled 
by  men  without  a  particle  of  fineness  in  their  natures 
— but  there's  always  something  to  be  said  on  both 
sides,  and  it's  time  woman  came  into  her  own,  any 
way,  if  she  is  ever  to  be  anything  but  man's  toy  for  his 
idle  moments — still  it  would  never  do  to  go  to  ex 
tremes  in  a  narrow  little  town  like  this  with  every  one 


184  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

just  looking  for  an  excuse  to  talk — but  it  would  be 
different  if  all  the  best  people  got  together  and  agreed 
to  do  it,  only  most  of  them  would  probably  back  out 
at  the  last  moment  and  that  smarty  on  the  Recorder 
would  try  to  be  funny  about  it — now  that  one  with 
the  long  coat  doesn't  look  so  terrible,  does  it?  or  do 
you  think  so? — of  course  it's  almost  the  same  as  a 
skirt  except  when  you  climb  on  or  something — a 
woman  has  to  think  of  those  things — wouldn't  Daisy 
Estelle  look  rather  stunning  in  that? — she  has  just  the 
figure  for  it.  Here's  this  No.  9872  with  the  Norfolk 
jacket  in  this  mail-order  catalogue — do  you  think 
that  looks  too  theatrical,  or  don't  you?  Of  course 
for  some  figures,  but  I've  always  been  able  to  wear 
And  so  forth,  for  a  month  or  so. 

"Late  in  the  fall  Henrietta  Templeton  Price  done 
it.  You  may  not  know  what  that  meant  to  Alonzo 
Price,  Choice  Villa  Sites  and  Price's  Addition  to  Red 
Gap.  Alonzo  is  this  kind:  I  met  him  the  day  Gussie 
Himebaugh  had  her  accident  when  the  mules  she  was 
driving  to  the  mowing  machine  run  away  out  on 
Himebaugh's  east  forty.  Alonzo  had  took  Doc  May- 
bury  out  and  passes  me  coming  back.  'How  bad 
was  she  hurt?'  I  asks.  The  poor  thing  looks  down 
greatly  embarrassed  and  mumbles:  'She  has  broken 
a  limb.'  'Leg  or  arm?'  I  blurts  out,  forgetting  all 
delicacy.  You'd  think  I  had  him  pinned  down, 
wouldn't  you?  Not  Lon,  though.  'A  lower  limb,' 
says  he,  coughing  and  looking  away. 

"You  see  how  men  are  till  we  put  a  spike  collar  and 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  185 

chain  on  'em.  When  Henrietta  declared  herself 
Alonzo  read  the  riot  act  and  declared  marital  law. 
But  there  was  Henrietta  with  the  collar  and  chain  and 
pretty  soon  Lon  was  saying:  'You're  quite  right, 
Pettikins,  and  you  ought  to  have  the  thanks  of  the 
community  for  showing  our  ladies  how  to  dress 
rationally  on  horseback.  It's  not  only  sensible  and 
safe  but  it's  modest — a  plain  pair  of  riding  breeches, 
no  coquetry,  no  frills,  nothing  but  stern  utility — of 
course  I  agree.' 

"'I  hoped  you  would,  darling,'  says  Henrietta. 
She  went  to  Miss  Gunslaugh  and  had  her  make  the 
costume,  being  one  who  rarely  does  things  by  halves. 
It  was  of  blue  velvet  corduroy,  with  a  fetching  little 
bolero  jacket,  and  the  things  themselves  were  fitted, 
if  you  know  what  I  mean.  And  stern  utility !  That 
suit  with  its  rosettes  and  bows  and  frogs  and  braid 
had  about  the  same  stern  utility  as  those  pretty  little 
tin  tongs  that  come  on  top  of  a  box  of  candy — ever 
see  anybody  use  one  of  those?  When  Henrietta  got 
dressed  for  her  first  ride  and  had  put  on  the  Cuban 
Pink  Face  Balm  she  looked  like  one  of  the  gypsy 
chorus  in  the  Bohemian  Girl  opera. 

"Alonzo  gulped  several  times  in  rapid  succession 
when  he  saw  her,  but  the  little  man  never  starts  any 
thing  he  don't  aim  to  finish,  and  it  was  too  late  to 
start  it  then.  Henrietta  brazened  her  way  through 
Main  Street  and  out  to  the  country  club  and  back, 
and  next  day  she  put  them  on  again  so  Otto  Hirsch, 
of  the  E-light  Studio,  could  come  up  and  take  her 


186  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

standing  by  the  horse  out  in  front  of  the  Price  man 
sion.  Then  they  was  laid  away  until  the  Grand 
Annual  Masquerade  Ball  of  the  Order  of  the  Eastern 
Star,  which  is  a  kind  of  hen  Masons,  when  she  again 
gave  us  a  flash  of  what  New  York  society  ladies  was 
riding  their  horse  in.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  Henrietta 
hates  a  horse  like  a  rattlesnake,  but  she  had  done  her 
pioneer  work  for  once  and  all. 

"Every  one  was  now  laughing  and  sneering  at  the 
old-fashioned  divided  skirt  with  which  woman  had 
endangered  her  life  on  a  horse,  and  wondering  how 
they  had  endured  the  clumsy  things  so  long;  and  come 
spring  all  the  prominent  young  society  buds  and 
younger  matrons  of  the  most  exclusive  set  who  could 
stay  on  a  horse  at  all  was  getting  theirs  ready  for  the 
approaching  season,  Red  Gap  being  like  London  in 
having  its  gayest  season  in  the  summer,  when  people 
can  get  out  more.  Even  Mis'  Judge  Ballard  fell  for 
it,  though  hers  was  made  of  severe  black  with  a  long 
coat.  She  looked  exactly  like  that  Methodist  min 
ister,  the  old  one,  that  we  had  three  years  ago. 

"Most  of  the  younger  set  used  the  mail-order  cat 
alogue,  their  figures  still  permitting  it.  And  maybe 
there  wasn't  a  lot  of  trying  on  behind  drawn  blinds 
pretty  soon,  and  delighted  giggles  and  innocent  girl 
ish  wonderings  about  whether  the  lowest  type  of  man 
really  ogles  as  much  under  certain  circumstances  as 
he's  said  to.  And  the  minute  the  roads  got  good  the 
telephone  of  Pierce's  Livery,  Feed,  and  Sale  Stable 
was  kept  on  the  ring.  Then  the  social  upheaval  was 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  187 

on.  Of  course  any  of  'em  looked  quiet  after  Hen 
rietta's  costume,  for  none  of  the  girls  but  Beryl  Mae 
Macomber,  a  prominent  young  society  bud,  aged 
seventeen,  had  done  anything  like  that.  But  it  was 
the  idea  of  the  thing. 

"A  certain  element  on  the  South  Side  made  a  lot 
of  talk  and  stirred  things  up  and  wrote  letters  to  the 
president  of  the  Civic  Purity  League,  who  was  Mis' 
Judge  Ballard  herself,  asking  where  this  unspeakable 
disrobing  business  was  going  to  end  and  calling  her 
attention  to  the  fate  that  befell  Sodom  and  Gomor 
rah.  But  Mis'  Ballard  she's  mixed  on  names  and 
gets  the  idea  these  parties  mean  Samson  and  Delilah 
instead  of  a  couple  of  twin  cities,  like  St.  Paul  and 
Minneapoh's,  and  she  writes  back  saying  what  have 
these  Bible  characters  got  to  do  with  a  lady  riding  on 
horseback — in  trousers,  it  is  true,  but  with  a  coat  fall 
ing  modestly  to  the  knee  on  each  side,  and  certain 
people  had  better  be  a  little  more  fussy  about 
things  that  really  matter  in  life  before  they  begin  to 
talk.  She  knew  who  she  was  hitting  at  all  right,  too. 
Trust  Mis' Ballard! 

"It  was  found  that  there  was  almost  the  expected 
amount  of  ogling  from  sidewalk  loafers,  at  first.  As 
Daisy  Estelle  Maybury  said,  it  seamed  as  if  a  girl 
couldn't  show  herself  on  the  public  thoroughfare 
without  being  subjected  to  insult.  Poor  Daisy 
Estelle !  She  had  been  a  very  popular  young  society 
belle,  and  was  considered  one  of  the  most  attractive 
girls  in  Red  Gap  until  this  happened.  No  one  had 


188          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

ever  suspected  it  of  her  in  the  least  degree  up  to  that 
time.  Of  course  it  was  too  late  after  she  was  once 
seen  off  her  horse.  Them  that  didn't  see  was  told  in 
full  detail  by  them  that  did.  Most  of  the  others  was 
luckier.  Beryl  Mae  Macomber  in  her  sport  shirt  and 
trouserettes  complained  constantly  about  the  odious 
wretches  along  Main  Street  and  Fourth,  where  the 
post  office  was.  She  couldn't  stop  even  twenty  min 
utes  in  front  of  the  post  office,  minding  her  own  busi 
ness  and  waiting  for  some  one  she  knew  to  come  along 
and  get  her  mail  for  her,  without  having  dozens  of 
men  stop  and  ogle  her.  That,  of  course,  was  during 
the  first  two  weeks  after  she  took  to  going  for  the 
mail,  though  the  eternal  feminine  in  Beryl  Mae  prob 
ably  thought  the  insulting  glances  was  going  to  keep 
up  forever. 

"I  watched  the  poor  child  one  day  along  in  the 
third  week,  waiting  there  in  front  of  the  post  office 
after  the  four  o'clock  mail,  and  no  one  hardly  ogled 
her  at  all  except  some  rude  children  out  from  school. 
What  made  it  more  pitiful,  leaning  right  there  against 
the  post  office  front  was  Jack  Shiels,  Sammie  Ham 
ilton,  and  little  old  Elmer  Cox,  Red  Gap's  three  town 
rowdies  that  ain't  done  a  stroke  of  work  since  the  can 
ning  factory  closed  down  the  fall  before,  creatures  that 
by  rights  should  have  been  leering  at  the  poor  child 
in  all  her  striking  beauty.  But,  no;  the  brutes  stand 
there  looking  at  nothing  much  until  Jack  Shiels  stares 
a  minute  at  this  horse  Beryl  Mae  is  on  and  pipes  up : 
'Why,  say,  I  thought  Pierce  let  that  little  bay  runt  go 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  189 

to  the  guy  that  was  in  here  after  polo  ponies  last 
Thursday.  I  sure  did.'  And  Sam  Hamilton  wakes 
up  and  says:  'No,  sir;  not  this  one.  He  got  rid  of  a 
little  mare  that  had  shoulders  like  this,  but  she  was  a 
roan  with  kind  of  mule  ears  and  one  froze  off.'  And 
little  old  Elmer  Cox,  ignoring  this  defenceless  young 
girl  with  his  impudent  eyes,  he  says:  'Yes,  Sam's 
right  for  once.  Pierce  tried  to  let  this  one  go,  too, 
but  ain't  you  took  a  look  at  his  hocks ! '  Then  along 
comes  Dean  Duke,  the  ratty  old  foreman  in  Pierce's 
stable,  and  he  don't  ogle  a  bit,  either,  like  you'd  ex 
pect  one  of  his  debased  calibre  to,  but  just  stops  and 
talks  this  horse  over  with  'em  and  says  yes,  it  was  his 
bad  hocks  that  lost  the  sale,  and  he  tells  'em  how  he 
had  told  Pierce  just  what  to  do  to  get  him  shaped  up 
for  a  quick  sale,  but  Pierce  wouldn't  listen  to  him, 
thinking  he  knew  it  all  himself;  and  there  the  four 
stood  and  gassed  about  this  horse  without  even  seeing 
Beryl  Mae,  let  alone  leering  at  her.  I  bet  she  was 
close  to  shedding  tears  of  girlish  mortification  as  she 
rode  off  without  ever  waiting  for  the  mail.  Things 
was  getting  to  a  pretty  pass.  If  low  creatures  lost  to 
all  decent  instincts,  like  these  four,  wouldn't  ogle  a 
girl  when  she  was  out  for  it,  what  could  be  expected 
of  the  better  element  of  the  town?  Still,  of  course, 
now  and  then  one  or  the  other  of  the  girls  would  have 
a  bit  of  luck  to  tell  of. 

"Well,  now  we  come  to  the  crookedest  bit  of 
work  I  ever  been  guilty  of,  though  first  telling  you 
about  Mr.  Burchell  Daggett,  an  Eastern  society  man 


190          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

from  Cedar  Rapids,  Iowa,  that  had  come  to  Red  Gap 
that  spring  to  be  assistant  cashier  in  the  First 
National,  through  his  uncle  having  stock  in  the 
thing.  He  was  a  very  pleasant  kind  of  youngish 
gentleman,  about  thirty-four,  I  reckon,  with  dark, 
parted  whiskers  and  gold  eyeglasses  and  very  good 
habits.  He  took  his  place  among  our  very  best 
people  right  off,  teaching  the  Bible  class  in  the  M.  E. 
Sabbath-school  and  belonging  to  the  Chamber  of 
Commerce  and  the  City  Beautiful  Association,  of 
which  he  was  made  vice-president,  and  being  promi 
nent  at  all  functions  held  in  our  best  homes.  He 
wasn't  at  all  one  of  them  that  lead  a  double  life  by 
stopping  in  at  the  Family  Liquor  Store  for  a  gin  fizz 
or  two  after  work  hours,  or  going  downtown  after 
supper  to  play  Kelly  pool  at  the  Temperance  Billiard 
Parlours  and  drink  steam  beer,  or  getting  in  with  the 
bunch  that  gathers  in  the  back  room  of  the  Owl  Cigar 
Store  of  an  evening  and  tells  these  here  suggestive 
stories.  Not  that  he  was  hide-bound.  If  he  felt  the 
need  for  a  shot  of  something  he'd  go  into  the  United 
States  Grill  and  have  a  glass  of  sherry  and  bitters 
brought  to  him  at  a  table  and  eat  a  cracker  with  it, 
and  he'd  take  in  every  show,  even  the  Dizzy  Belles  of 
Gotham  Big  Blonde  Beauty  Show.  He  was  refined 
and  even  moral  in  the  best  sense  of  the  word,  but  still 
human. 

"Our  prominent  young  society  buds  took  the  keen 
est  notice  of  him  at  once,  as  would  naturally  happen, 
he  being  a  society  bachelor  of  means  and  by  long  odds 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  191 

the  best  catch  in  Red  Gap  since  old  Potter  Knapp,  of 
the  Loan  and  Trust  Company,  had  broke  his  period 
of  mourning  for  his  third  wife  by  marrying  Myrtle 
Wade  that  waited  on  table  at  the  Occidental  Hotel, 
with  the  black  band  still  on  his  left  coat  sleeve.  It's 
no  exaggeration  to  say  that  Mr.  Burchell  Daggett  be 
came  the  most  sought-after  social  favourite  among 
Reg  Gap's  hoot  mondy  in  less  than  a  week  after  he 
unpacked  his  trunk.  But  it  was  very  soon  discovered 
by  the  bright-eyed  little  gangsters  of  the  best  circles 
that  he  wasn't  going  to  be  an  easy  one  to  disable. 
Naturally  when  a  man  has  fought  'em  off  to  his  age  he 
has  learned  much  of  woodcraft  and  the  hunter's  cun 
ning  wiles,  and  this  one  had  sure  developed  timber 
sense.  He  beat  'em  at  their  own  game  for  three 
months  by  the  simple  old  device  of  not  playing  any 
favourite  for  one  single  minute,  and  very,  very  sel 
dom  getting  alone  with  one  where  the  foul  stroke  can 
be  dealt  by  the  frailest  hand  with  muscular  pre 
cision.  If  he  took  Daisy  Estelle  Maybury  to  the 
chicken  pie  supper  to  get  a  new  carpet  for  the  Presby 
terian  parsonage,  he'd  up  and  take  Beryl  Mae  and  her 
aunt,  or  Gussie  Himebaugh,  or  Luella  Stultz,  to  the 
lawn  feet  at  Judge  Ballard's  for  new  uniforms  for  the 
band  boys.  At  the  Bazaar  of  All  Nations  he  bought 
as  many  chances  of  one  girl  as  he  did  of  another,  and 
if  he  hadn't  any  more  luck  than  a  rabbit  and  won 
something — a  hanging  lamp  or  a  celluloid  manicure 
set  in  a  plush-lined  box — he'd  simply  put  it  up  to  be 
raffled  off  again  for  the  good  of  the  cause.  And  none 


192  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

of  that  moonlight  loitering  along  shaded  streets  for 
him,  where  the  dirk  is  so  often  drove  stealthily  be 
tween  a  man's  ribs,  and  him  thinking  all  the  time  he's 
only  indulging  in  a  little  playful  nonsense.  Often  as 
not  he'd  take  two  girls  at  once,  where  all  could  be 
merry  without  danger  of  anything  happening. 

"It  was  no  time  at  all  till  this  was  found  out  on 
him.  It  was  seen  that  under  a  pleasing  exterior, 
looking  all  too  easy  to  overcome  by  any  girl  in  her 
right  mind,  he  had  powers  of  resistance  and  evasion 
that  was  like  steel.  Of  course  this  only  stirred  the 
proud  beauties  on  to  renewed  and  crookeder  efforts. 
Every  darned  one  of  'em  felt  that  her  innocent  young 
girlhood  was  challenged,  and  would  she  let  it  go  at 
that?  Not  so.  My  lands!  What  snares  and  dead 
falls  was  set  for  this  wise  old  timber  wolf  that  didn't 
look  it,  with  his  smiling  ways  and  seemingly  careless 
response  to  merry  banter,  and  so  forth ! 

"And  of  course  every  one  of  these  shrinking  little 
scoundrels  thought  at  once  of  her  new  riding  costume, 
so  no  time  at  all  was  lost  in  organizing  the  North  Side 
Riding  and  Sports  Club,  which  Mr.  Burchell  Daggett 
gladly  joined,  having,  as  he  said,  an  eye  for  a  horse 
and  liking  to  get  out  after  banking  hours  to  where  all 
Nature  seems  to  smile  and  you  can  let  your  mount 
out  a  bit  over  the  firm,  smooth  road.  Them  that  had 
held  off  until  now,  on  account  of  the  gossip  and  leer 
ing,  hurried  up  and  got  into  line  with  No.  9872  in  the 
mail-order  catalogue,  or  went  to  Miss  Gunslaugh,  who 
by  this  time  had  a  female  wax  dummy  in  her  window 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  193 

in  a  neat  brown  suit  and  puttees,  with  a  coat  just 
opening  and  one  foot  advanced  carelessly,  with 
gauntlets  and  a  riding  crop,  and  a  fetching  little  cap 
over  the  wind-blown  hair  and  the  clear,  wonderful 
blue  eyes.  Oh,  you  can  bet  every  last  girl  of  the 
bunch  was  seeing  herself  send  back  picture  postals  to 
her  rivals  telling  what  a  royal  time  they  was  having 
at  Palm  or  Rockaway  Beach  or  some  place,  and  sec- 
ing  the  engraved  cards — '  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Burchell  Dag- 
gett,  at  Home  After  the  Tenth,  Ophir  Avenue,  Red 
Gap,  Wash.' 

"Ain't  we  good  when  you  really  get  us,  if  you  ever 
do — because  some  don't.  Many,  indeed!  I  reckon 
there  never  was  a  woman  yet  outside  of  a  feeb'  home 
that  didn't  believe  she  could  be  an  A.  No.  1  siren  if  she 
only  had  the  nerve  to  dress  the  part;  never  one  that 
didn't  just  ache  to  sway  men  to  her  lightest  whim, 
and  believe  she  could — not  for  any  evil  purpose, 
mind  you,  but  just  to  show  her  power.  Think  of  the 
tender  hearts  that  must  have  shuddered  over  the 
damage  they  could  and  actually  might  do  in  one  of 
them  French  bathing  suits  like  you  are  said  to  witness 
in  Paris  and  Atlantic  City  and  other  sinks  of  iniquity. 
And  here  was  these  well-known  society  favourites 
wrought  up  by  this  legible  party,  as  the  French  say, 
till  each  one  was  ready  to  go  just  as  far  as  the  Civic 
Purity  League  would  let  her  in  order  to  sweep  him  off 
his  feet  in  one  mad  moment.  Quite  right,  too.  It 
all  depends  on  what  the  object  is,  don't  it;  and  wasn't 
theirs  honourable  matrimony  with  an  establishment 


194  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

and  a  lawn  in  front  of  it  with  a  couple  of  cast-iron 
moose,  mebbe? 

"And  amid  all  this  quaint  girlish  enterprise  and 
secret  infamy  was  the  problem  of  Hetty  Tip  ton. 
Hetty  had  been  a  friend  and  a  problem  of  mine  for 
seven  years,  or  ever  since  she  come  back  from  normal 
to  teach  in  the  third-grade  grammar  school;  a  fine, 
clean,  honest,  true-blue  girl,  mebbe  not  as  pretty 
you'd  say  at  first  as  some  others,  but  you  like  her 
better  after  you  look  a  few  times  more,  and  with  not 
the  slightest  nonsense  about  her.  That  last  was 
Hetty's  one  curse.  I  ask  you,  what  chance  has  a  girl 
got  with  no  nonsense  about  her?  Hetty  won  my 
sympathy  right  at  the  start  by  this  infirmity  of  hers, 
which  was  easily  detected,  and  for  seven  years  I'd 
been  trying  to  cure  her  of  it,  but  no  use.  Oh,  she  was 
always  took  out  regular  enough  and  well  liked,  but 
the  gilded  youth  of  Red  Gap  never  fought  for  her 
smiles.  They'd  take  her  to  parties  and  dances,  turn 
and  turn  about,  but  they  always  respected  her,  which 
is  the  greatest  blight  a  man  can  put  on  one  of  us,  if 
you  know  what  I  mean.  Every  man  at  a  party  was 
always  careful  to  dance  a  decent  number  of  times 
with  Hetty  and  see  that  she  got  back  to  her  seat;  and 
wasn't  it  warm  in  here  this  evening,  yes,  it  was;  and 
wouldn't  she  have  a  glass  of  the  punch — No,  thank 
you — then  he'd  gallop  off  to  have  some  fun  with  a 
mere  shallow-pated  fool  that  had  known  how  from 
the  cradle.  It  was  always  a  puzzle  to  me,  because 
Hetty  dressed  a  lot  better  than  most  of  them,  know- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  195 

ing  what  to  wear  and  how,  and  could  take  a  joke  if  it 
come  slow,  and  laid  herself  out  to  be  amiable  to  one 
and  all.  I  kind  of  think  it  must  be  something  about 
her  mentality.  Maybe  it  is  too  mental.  I  can't  put 
her  to  you  any  plainer  than  to  say  that  every  single 
girl  in  town,  young  and  old,  just  loved  her,  and  not 
one  of  them  up  to  this  time  had  ever  said  an  unkind  or 
feminine  thing  about  her.  I  guess  you  know  what 
that  would  mean  of  any  woman. 

"Hetty  was  now  coming  twenty-nine — we  never 
spoke  of  this,  but  I  could  count  back — and  it's  my 
firm  belief  that  no  man  had  ever  proposed  marriage 
or  anything  else  on  earth  to  her.  Wilbur  Todd  had 
once  endeavoured  to  hold  her  hand  out  on  the  porch 
at  a  country-club  dance  and  she  had  repulsed  him  in 
all  kindness  but  firmly.  She  told  him  she  couldn't 
bring  herself  to  permit  a  familiarity  of  that  sort  ex 
cept  to  the  man  who  would  one  day  lead  her  to  the 
altar,  which  is  something  I  believe  she  got  from  writ 
ing  to  a  magazine  about  a  young  girl's  perplexities. 
And  here,  in  spite  of  her  record,  this  poor  thing  had 
dared  to  raise  her  eyes  to  none  other  than  this  Mr. 
Burchell  Daggett.  There  was  something  kind  of 
grand  and  despairing  about  the  impudence  of  it 
when  you  remember  these  here  trained  efficiency 
experts  she  was  competing  with.  Yet  so  it  was.  She 
would  drop  in  on  me  after  school  for  a  cup  of  tea  and 
tell  me  frankly  how  distinguished  his  manner  was  and 
what  shapely  features  he  had  and  what  fine  eyes,  and 
how  there  was  a  certain  note  in  his  voice  at  times,  and 


196  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

had  I  ever  noticed  that  one  stubborn  lock  of  hair  that 
stuck  out  back  of  his  left  ear?  Of  course  that  last 
item  settled  it.  When  they  notice  that  lock  of  hair 
you  know  the  ship  has  struck  the  reef  and  all  hands 
are  perishing. 

"And  it  seemed  that  the  cuss  had  not  only  shown 
her  more  than  a  little  attention  at  evening  functions 
but  had  escorted  her  to  the  midspring  production  of 
*  Hamlet'  by  the  Red  Gap  Amateur  Theatrical  and 
Dramatic  Society.  True,  he  had  conducted  himself 
like  a  perfect  gentleman  every  minute  they  was  alone 
together,  even  when  they  had  to  go  home  in  Eddie 
Pierce's  hack  because  it  was  raining  when  the  show  let 
out — but  would  I,  or  would  I  not,  suspect  from  all 
this  that  he  was  in  the  least  degree  thinking  of  her  in 
a  way  that — you  know! 

"Poor  child  of  twenty-eight,  with  her  hungry  eyes 
and  flushed  face  while  she  was  showing  down  her 
hand  to  me!  I  seen  the  scoundrel's  play  at  once. 
Hetty  was  the  one  safe  bet  for  him  in  Red  Gap's  social 
whirl.  He  was  wise,  all  right — this  Mr.  D.  He'd 
known  in  a  second  he  could  trust  himself  alone  with 
that  girl  and  be  as  safe  as  a  babe  in  its  mother's  arms. 
Of  course  I  couldn't  say  this  to  Hetty.  I  just  said  he 
was  a  man  that  seemed  to  know  his  own  mind  very 
clearly,  whatever  it  was,  and  Hetty  blushed  some 
more  and  said  that  something  within  her  responded 
to  a  certain  note  in  his  voice.  We  let  it  go  at  that. 

"So  I  think  and  ponder  about  poor  Hetty,  trying 
to  invent  some  conspiracy  that  would  fix  it  right,  be- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  197 

cause  she  was  the  ideal  mate  for  an  assistant  cashier 
that  had  a  certain  position  to  keep  up.  For  that  mat 
ter  she  was  good  enough  for  any  man.  Then  I  hear  she 
has  joined  the  riding  club,  and  an  all  day's  ride  has 
been  planned  for  the  next  Saturday  up  to  S  tender's 
Spring,  with  a  basket  lunch  and  a  romantic  ride 
back  by  moonlight.  Of  course,  I  don't  believe  in  any 
of  this  spiritualist  stuff,  but  you  can't  tell  me  there 
ain't  something  in  it,  mind-reading  or  something, 
with  the  hunches  you  get  when  parties  is  in  some 
grave  danger. 

"Stella  Ballard  it  was  tells  me  about  the  picnic, 
calling  me  in  as  I  passed  their  house  to  show  me  her 
natty  new  riding  togs  that  had  just  come  from  the 
mail-order  house.  She  called  from  back  of  a  curtain, 
and  when  I  got  into  the  parlour  she  had  them  on, 
pleased  as  all  get-out.  Pretty  they  was,  too — riding 
breeches  and  puttees  and  a  man's  flannel  shirt  and  a 
neat-fitting  Norfolk  jacket,  and  Stella  being  a  fine, 
upstanding  figure. 

"'They  may  cause  considerable  talk,'  says  she, 
smoothing  down  one  leg  where  it  wrinkled  a  bit,  'but 
really  I  think  they  look  perfectly  stunning  on  me, 
and  wasn't  it  lucky  they  fit  me  so  beautifully? 
They're  called  the  Non  Plush  Ultra.' 

'"The  what?'  I  says. 

'"The  Non  Plush  Ultra,5  she  answers.  'That's 
the  name  of  them  sewed  in  the  band.' 

"'What's  that  mean?'  I  wanted  to  know. 

"'WTiy,'  says  Stella,   'that's  Latin  or  Greek,  I 


198  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

forget  which,  and  it  means  they're  the  best,  I  believe. 
Oh,  let  me  see!  Why,  it  means' nothing  beyond,  or 
something  like  that;  the  farthest  you  can  go,  I  think. 
One  forgets  all  that  sort  of  thing  after  leaving  high 
school.' 

"'Well,'  I  says,  'they  fit  fine,  and  it's  the  only 
modest  rig  for  a  woman  to  ride  a  horse  in,  but  they 
certainly  are  non  plush,  all  right.  That  thin  goods 
will  never  wear  long  against  saddle  leather,  take  my 
word  for  it.' 

"  But  of  course  this  made  no  impression  on  Stella — 
she  was  standing  on  the  centre  table  by  now,  so  she 
could  lamp  herself  in  the  glass  over  the  mantel — and 
then  she  tells  me  about  the  excursion  for  Saturday 
and  how  Mr.  Burchell  Daggett  is  enthused  about  it, 
him  being  a  superb  horseman  himself,  and,  if  I  know 
what  she  means,  don't  I  think  she  carries  herself  in 
the  saddle  almost  better  than  any  girl  in  her  set,  and 
won't  her  style  show  better  than  ever  in  this  duck 
of  a  costume,  and  she  must  get  her  tan  shoes  polished, 
and  do  I  think  Mr.  Daggett  really  meant  anything 
when  he  said  he'd  expect  her  some  day  to  return  the 
masonic  pin  she  had  lifted  off  his  vest  the  other  night 
at  the  dance,  and  so  on. 

"It  was  while  she  was  babbling  this  stuff  that  I  get 
the  strange  hunch  that  Hetty  Tipton  is  in  grave  dan 
ger  and  I  ought  to  run  to  her;  it  seemed  almost  I 
could  hear  her  calling  on  me  to  save  her  from  some 
horrible  fate.  So  I  tell  Stella  yes,  she's  by  far  the 
finest  rider  in  the  whole  Eoilanche  Valley,  and  she 


'SHE  WAS  STANDING  ON  THE  CENTRE  TABLE  BY  NOW,  SO  SHE 
COULD  LAMP  HERSELF  IN  THE  GLASS  OVER  THE  MANTEL" 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  199 

ought  to  get  anything  she  wants  with  that  suit  on, 
and  then  I  beat  it  quick  over  to  the  Ezra  Button 
house  where  Hetty  boards. 

"You  can  laugh  all  you  want  to,  but  that  hunch  of 
mine  was  the  God's  truth.  Hetty  was  in  the  gravest 
danger  she'd  faced  since  one  time  in  early  infancy 
when  she  got  give  morphine  for  quinine.  What 
made  it  more  horrible,  she  hadn't  the  least  notion  of 
her  danger.  Quite  the  contrary. 

"Thank  the  stars  I've  come  in  time!'  I  gasps  as 
I  rushes  in  on  her,  for  there's  the  poor  girl  before  her 
mirror  in  a  pair  of  these  same  Non  Plush  Ultras  and 
looking  as  pleased  with  herself  as  if  she  had  some 
reason  to  be. 

"'Back  into  your  skirts  quick!'  I  says.  'I'm  a 
strong  woman  and  all  that,  but  still  I  can  be  affected 
more  than  you'd  think.' 

"Poor  Hetty  stutters  and  turns  red  and  her  chin 
begins  to  quiver,  so  I  gentled  her  down  and  tried  to 
explain,  though  seeing  quick  that  I  must  tell  her 
everything  but  the  truth.  I  reckon  nothing  in  this 
world  can  look  funnier  than  a  woman  wearing  them 
things  that  had  never  ought  to  for  one  reason  or 
another.  There  was  more  reasons  than  that  in 
Hetty's  case.  Dignity  was  the  first  safe  bet  I  could 
think  of  with  her,  so  I  tried  that. 

"'I  know  all  you  would  say,'  says  the  poor  thing 
in  answer,  'but  isn't  it  true  that  men  rather  like  one 
to  be — oh,  well,  you  know — just  the  least  bit  daring? ' 

"  'Truest  thing  in  the  world,'  I  says, '  but  bless  your 


200          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

heart,  did  you  suspicion  riding  breeches  was  daring 
on  a  woman?  Not  so.  A  girl  wearing  'em  can't  be 
any  more  daring  after  the  first  quick  shock  is  over 
than — well,  you  read  the  magazines,  don't  you? 
You've  seen  those  pictures  of  family  life  in  darkest 
Africa  that  the  explorers  and  monkey  hunters  bring 
home,  where  the  wives,  mothers,  and  sweethearts, 
God  bless  'em !  wear  only  what  the  scorching  climate 
demands.  Didn't  it  strike  you  that  one  of  them 
women  without  anything  on  would  have  a  hard  time 
if  she  tried  to  be  daring — or  did  it?  No  woman  can 
be  daring  without  the  proper  clothes  for  it,'  I  says 
firmly,  'and  as  for  you,  I  tell  you  plain,  get  into  the 
most  daring  and  immodest  thing  that  was  ever  in 
vented  for  woman — which  is  the  well-known  skirt.' 

"'Oh,  Ma  Pettengill,'  cries  the  poor  thing,  'I 
never  meant  anything  horrid  and  primitive  when  I 
said  daring.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  think  these  are 
quite  modest  to  the  intelligent  eye.' 

"'Just  what  I'm  trying  to  tell  you,'  I  says.  'Ex 
actly  that;  they're  modest  to  any  eye  whatever.  But 
here  you  are  embarked  on  a  difficult  enterprise,  with  a 
band  of  flinty-hearted  cutthroats  trying  to  beat  .you 
to  it,  and,  my  dear  child,  you  have  a  staunch  nature 
and  a  heart  of  gold,  but  you  simply  can't  afford  to  be 
modest.' 

'"I  don't  understand,'  says  she,  looking  at  herself 
in  the  glass  again. 

"'Trust  me,  anyway,'  I  implores.  'Let  others 
wear  their  Non  Plush  Ultras  which  are  No.  9872' — 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          201 

she  tries  to  correct  my  pronunciation,  but  I  wouldn't 
stop  for  that.  *  Never  mind  how  it's  pronounced/ 
I  says,  'because  I  know  well  the  meaning  of  it  in  a 
foreign  language.  It  means  the  limit,  and  it's  a  very 
desirable  limit  for  many,  but  for  you,'  I  says  plainly, 
'it's  different.  Your  Non  Plush  Ultra  will  have  to 
be  a  neat,  ankle-length  riding  skirt.  You  got  one, 
haven't  you?' 

" 'I  have,'  says  she,  'a  very  pretty  one  of  tan  cordu 
roy,  almost  new,  but  I  had  looked  forward  to  these, 
and  I  don't  see  yet ' 

"Then  I  thought  of  another  way  I  might  get  to  her 
without  blurting  out  the  truth.  'Listen,  Hetty,'  I 
says,  'and  remember  not  only  that  I'm  your  friend 
but  that  I  know  a  heap  more  about  this  fool  world 
than  you  do.  I've  had  bitter  experiences,  and  one  of 
them  got  me  at  the  time  I  first  begun  to  wear  riding 
pants  myself,  which  must  have  been  about  the  time 
you  was  beginning  to  bite  dents  into  your  silver  mug 
that  Aunt  Caroline  sent.  I  was  a  handsome  young 
hellion,  I  don't  mind  telling  you,  and  they  looked 
well  on  me,  and  when  Lysander  John  urged  me  to  be 
brave  and  wear  'em  outside  I  was  afraid  all  the  men 
within  a  day's  ride  was  going  to  sneak  round  to  stare 
at  me.  My!  I  was  so  embarrassed,  also  with  that 
same  feeling  you  got  in  your  heart  this  minute  that 
it  was  taking  an  unfair  advantage  of  any  man — you 
know!  I  felt  like  I  was  using  all  the  power  of  my 
young  beauty  for  unworthy  ends. 

"  'Well,  do  you  know  what  I  got  when  I  first  rode 


202  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

out  on  the  ranch?  I  got  just  about  the  once-over 
from  every  brute  there,  and  that  was  all.  If  one  of 
them  ranch  hands  had  ever  ogled  me  a  second  time 
I'd  have  known  it  all  right,  but  I  never  caught  one 
of  the  scoundrels  at  it.  First  I  said:  "Now,  ain't 
that  fine  and  chivalrous?"  Then  I  got  wise.  It 
wasn't  none  of  this  here  boasted  Western  chivalry, 
but  just  plain  lack  of  interest.  I  admit  it  made  me 
mad  at  first.  Any  man  on  the  place  was  only  too 
glad  to  look  me  over  when  I  had  regular  clothes  on, 
but  dress  me  like  Lysander  John  and  they  didn't 
look  at  me  any  oftener  than  they  did  him.  Not  as 
often,  of  course,  because  as  a  plain  human  being  and 
man's  equal  I  wasn't  near  as  interesting  as  he  was.' 

"'But  then,  too,'  says  Hetty,  who  had  only  been 
about  half  listening  to  my  lecture,  'I  thought  it 
might  be  striking  a  blow  at  the  same  time  for  the 
freedom  of  woman.' 

"Well,  you  know  how  that  freedom-of-the-sex 
talk  always  gets  me  going.  I  was  mad  enough  for  a 
minute  to  spank  her  just  as  she  stood  there  in  them 
Non  Plush  Ultras  she  was  so  proud  of.  And  I  did 
let  out  some  high  talk.  Mrs.  Dutton  told  her  after 
ward  she  thought  sure  we  was  having  words. 

"'Freedom  from  skirts,'  I  says,  'is  the  last  thing 
your  sex  wants.  Skirts  is  the  final  refuge  of  im 
modesty,  to  which  women  will  cling  like  grim  death. 
They  will  do  any  possible  thing  to  a  skirt — slit  it, 
thin  it,  shorten  it,  hike  it  up  one  side — people  are 
setting  up  nights  right  now  thinking  up  some  new 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  203 

thing  to  do  to  it — but  women  won't  give  it  up  and 
dress  modestly  as  men  do  because  it's  the  only  unfair 
drag  they  got  left  with  the  men.  I  see  one  of  our 
offended  sex  is  daily  asking  right  out  in  a  newspaper: 
"Are  women  people?"  I'd  just  like  to  whisper  to 
her  that  no  one  yet  knows. 

"'If  they'll  quit  their  skirts,  dress  as  decently  as  a 
man  does  so  they  won't  have  any  but  a  legitimate 
pull  with  him,  we'd  have  a  chance  to  find  out  if 
they're  good  for  anything  else.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
they  don't  want  to  be  people  and  dress  modestly  and 
wear  hats  you  couldn't  pay  over  eight  dollars  for. 
I  believe  there  was  one  once,  but  the  poor  thing  never 
got  any  notice  from  either  sex  after  she  became — a 
people,  as  you  might  say.' 

"  Well,  I  was  going  on  to  get  off  a  few  more  things 
I'd  got  madded  up  to,  but  I  caught  the  look  in  poor 
Hetty's  face,  and  it  would  have  melted  a  stone. 
Poor  child!  There  she  was,  wanting  a  certain  man 
and  willing  to  wear  or  not  wear  anything  on  earth 
that  would  nail  him,  and  not  knowing  what  would 
do  it,  and  complicating  her  ignorance  with  meaning 
less  worries  about  modesty  and  daringness  and  the 
freedom  of  her  poor  sex,  that  ain't  ever  even  deuce- 
low  with  one  woman  in  a  million. 

"And  right  then,  watching  her  distress,  all  at  once 
I  get  my  big  inspiration — it  just  flooded  me  like  the 
sun  coming  up.  I  don't  know  if  I'm  like  other  folks, 
but  things  do  come  to  me  that  way.  And  not  only 
was  it  a  great  truth,  but  it  got  me  out  of  the  hole 


204  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

of  having  to  tell  Hetty  certain  truths  about  herself 
that  these  Non  Plush  Ultras  made  all  too  glaring. 

"'Listen,'  I  says:  'You  believe  I'm  your  friend, 
don't  you?  And  you  believe  anything  I  tell  you  is 
from  the  heart  out  and  will  probably  have  a  grain  of 
sense  in  it.  Well,  here  is  an  inspired  thought: 
Women  won't  ever  dress  modestly  like  men  do  be 
cause  men  don't  want  'em  to.  I  never  saw  a  man 
yet  that  did  if  he'd  tell  the  truth,  and  so  this  here  dark 
city  stranger  won't  be  any  exception.  Now,  then, 
what  do  we  see  on  Saturday  next?  Why,  we  see  this 
here  gay  throng  sally  forth  for  Stender's  Spring,  the 
youth  and  beauty  of  Red  Gap,  including  Mr.  D., 
with  his  nice  refined  odour  of  Russia  leather  and 
bank  bills  of  large  size — from  fifties  up — that  haven't 
been  handled  much.  The  crowd  is  of  all  sexes, 
technically,  like  you  might  say;  a  lot  of  nice,  sweet 
girls  along  but  dressed  to  be  mere  jolly  young  rough 
necks,  and  just  as  interesting  to  the  said  stranger  as 
the  regular  boys  that  will  be  present — hardly  more 
so.  And  now,  as  for  poor  little  meek  you — you  will 
look  wild  and  Western,  understand  me,  but  feminine; 
exactly  like  the  coloured  cigarette  picture  that  says 
under  it  "Rocky  Mountain  Cow  Girl."  You  will 
be  in  your  pretty  tan  skirt — be  sure  to  have  it  pressed 
— and  a  blue-striped  sport  bloose  that  I  just  saw  in 
the  La  Mode  window,  and  you'll  get  some  other 
rough  Western  stuff  there,  too:  a  blue  silk  neckerchief 
and  a  natty  little  cow-girl  sombrero — the  La  Mode 
is  showing  a  good  one  called  the  La  Parisienne  for 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          205 

four  fifty-eight — and  the  daintiest  pair  of  tan  kid 
gauntlets  you  can  find,  and  don't  forget  a  pair  of 
tan  silk  stockings ' 

"  'They  won't  show  in  my  riding  boots,'  says  Hetty, 
looking  as  if  she  was  coming  to  life  a  little. 

"  'Tush  for  the  great,  coarse,  commonsense  riding 
boots,'  I  says  firmly;  'you  will  wear  precisely  that 
neat  little  pair'  of  almost  new  tan  pumps  with  the 
yellow  bows  that  you're  standing  in  now.  Do  you 
get  me?' 

"'But  that  would  be  too  dainty  and  absurd,'  says 
Hetty. 

"'Exactly!'  I  says,  shutting  my  mouth  hard. 

"'Why,  I  almost  believe  I  do  get  you,'  says  she, 
looking  religiously  up  into  the  future  like  that  lady 
saint  playing  the  organ  in  the  picture. 

'"Another  thing,'  I  says:  'You  are  deathly  afraid 
of  a  horse  and  was  hardly  ever  on  one  but  once  when 
you  were  a  teeny  girl,  but  you  do  love  the  open  life,  so 
you  just  nerved  yourself  up  to  come.' 

'"I  believe  I  see  more  clearly  than  ever,'  says 
Hetty.  She  grew  up  on  a  ranch,  knows  more  about 
a  horse  than  the  horse  himself  does,  and  would  be  a 
top  rider  most  places,  with  the  cheap  help  we  get 
nowadays  that  can  hardly  set  a  saddle. 

" 'Also  from  time  to  time,'  I  goes  on,  'you  want  to 
ask  this  Mr.  D.  little,  timid,  silly  questions  that  will 
just  tickle  him  to  death  and  make  him  feel  superior. 
Ask  him  to  tell  you  which  legs  of  a  horse  the  chaps 
go  on,  and  other  things  like  that;  ask  him  if  the  sash 


206  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

that  holds  the  horrid  old  saddle  on  isn't  so  tight  it's 
hurting  your  horse.  After  the  lunch  is  et,  go  over 
to  the  horse  all  alone  and  stroke  his  nose  and  call 
him  a  dear  and  be  found  by  the  gent  when  he  follows 
you  over  trying  to  feed  the  noble  animal  a  hard- 
boiled  egg  and  a  couple  of  pickles  or  something. 
Take  my  word  for  it,  he'll  be  over  all  right  and  have 
a  hearty  laugh  at  your  confusion,  and  begin  to  wonder 
what  it  is  about  you. 

"'How  about  falling  off  and  spraining  my  ankle 
on  the  way  back?'  demands  the  awakening  vestal 
with  a  gleam  in  her  eye. 

"'No  good,'  I  says;  'pretty  enough  for  a  minute, 
but  it  would  make  trouble  if  you  kept  up  the  bluff, 
and  if  there's  one  thing  a  man  hates  more  than  an 
other  it's  to  have  a  woman  round  that  makes  any 
trouble.' 

'"You  have  me  started  on  a  strange  new  train  of 
thought,'  says  Hetty. 

"'I  think  it's  a  good  one,'  I  tells  her,  'but  remem 
ber  there  are  risks.  For  one  thing,  you  know  how 
popular  you  have  always  been  with  all  the  girls. 
Well,  after  this  day  none  of  'em  will  hardly  speak  to 
you  because  of  your  low-lifed,  deceitful  game,  and 
the  things  they'll  say  of  you — such  things  as  only 
woman  can  say  of  woman!' 

"'I  shall  not  count  the  cost,'  says  she  firmly. 
'And  now  I  must  hurry  down  for  that  sport  bloose — 
blue-striped,  you  said?' 

'"Something  on  that  order,'  I  says,  'that  fits  only 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  207 

too  well.  You  can  do  almost  anything  you  want  to 
with  your  neck  and  arms,  but  remember  strictly — 
a  skirt  is  your  one  and  only  Non  Plush  Ultra.' 

"So  I  went  home  all  flushed  and  eager,  thinking 
joyously  how  little  men — the  poor  dubs — ever  suspect 
how  it's  put  over  on  'em,  and  the  next  day,  which 
was  Friday,  I  thought  of  a  few  more  underhand 
things  she  could  do.  So  when  she  run  in  to  see  me 
that  afternoon,  the  excitement  of  the  chase  in  her 
eye,  she  wanted  I  should  go  along  on  this  picnic. 
I  says  yes,  I  will,  being  that  excited  myself  and  want 
ing  to  see  really  if  I  was  a  double-faced  genius  or 
wasn't  I?  Henrietta  Price  couldn't  go  on  account  of 
being  still  lame  from  her  ride  of  a  week  ago,  so  I 
could  go  as  chaperone,  and  anyway  I  knew  the  dear 
girls  would  all  be  glad  to  have  me  because  I  would 
look  so  different  from  them — like  a  genial  old  ranch 
foreman  going  out  on  rodeo — and  the  boys  was 
always  glad  to  see  me  along  anyway.  'I'll  be  there,' 
I  says  to  Hetty.  'And  here — don't  forget  at  all 
times  to-morrow  to  carry  this  little  real  lace  hand 
kerchief  I'm  giving  you.' 

"I  was  at  the  meeting-place  next  morning  at  nine. 
None  of  the  other  girls  was  on  time,  of  course,  but 
that  was  just  as  well,  because  Aggie  Tuttle  had  got 
her  father  to  come  down  to  the  sale  yard  to  pack  a 
mule  with  the  hampers  of  lunch.  Jeff  Tuttle  is  a 
good  packer  all  right,  but  too  inflamed  in  the  case  of  a 
mule,  which  he  hates.  They  always  know  up  and 
down  that  street  when  he's  packing  one;  ladies  drag 


208  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

their  children  by  as  fast  as  they  can.  But  Jeff  had 
the  hitch  all  throwed  before  any  of  the  girls  showed 
up,  and  all  began  in  a  lovely  manner,  the  crowd  of 
about  fifteen  getting  off  not  more  than  an  hour  late; 
Mr.  Burchell  in  the  lead  and  a  bevy  of  these  jolly 
young  rascals  in  their  Non  Plush  Ultras  riding  herd  on 
him. 

"Every  girl  cast  cordial  glances  of  pity  at  poor 
Hetty  when  she  showed  up  in  her  neat  skirt  and  silly 
tan  pumps  with  the  ridiculous  silk  stockings  and  the 
close-fitting  blue-striped  thing,  free  at  the  neck,  and 
her  pretty  hair  all  neated  under  the  La  Parisienne 
cow-girl  hat.  Oh,  they  felt  kinder  than  ever  before 
to  poor  old  Hetty  when  they  saw  her  as  little  daring 
as  that,  cheering  her  with  a  hearty  uproar,  slapping 
their  Non  Plush  Ultras  with  their  caps  or  gloves, 
and  then  giggling  confidentially  to  one  another. 
Hetty  accepted  their  applause  with  what  they  call  a 
pretty  show  of  confusion  and  gored  her  horse  with 
her  heel  on  the  off  side  so  it  looked  as  if  the  vicious 
brute  was  running  away  and  she  might  fall  off  any 
minute,  but  somehow  she  didn't,  and  got  him  soothed 
with  frightened  words  and  by  taking  the  hidden  heel 
out  of  his  slats — though  not  until  Mr.  D.  had  noticed 
her  good  and  then  looked  again  once  or  twice. 

"And  so  the  party  moved  on  for  an  hour  or  two, 
with  the  roguish  young  roughnecks  cutting  up  merrily 
at  all  times,  pretending  to  be  cowboys  coming  to 
town  on  pay  day,  swinging  their  hats,  giving  the 
long  yell,  and  doing  roughriding  to  cut  each  other 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  209 

away  from  the  side  of  Mr.  D.  every  now  and  then, 
with  a  noisy  laugh  of  good  nature  to  hide  the  poisoned 
dagger.  Daisy  Estelle  Maybury  is  an  awful  good 
rider,  too,  and  got  next  to  the  hero  about  every  time 
she  wanted  to.  Poor  thing,  if  she  only  knew  that 
once  she  gets  off  a  horse  in  'em  it  makes  all  the  differ 
ence  in  the  world. 

"The  dark  city  stranger  seemed  to  enjoy  it  fine, 
all  this  noise  and  cutting  up  and  cowboy  antics  like 
they  was  just  a  lot  of  high-spirited  young  men  to 
gether,  but  I  never  weakened  in  my  faith  for  one 
minute.  'Laugh  on,  my  proud  beauties/  I  says, 
'but  a  time  will  come,  just  as  sure  as  you  look  and 
act  like  a  passel  of  healthy  boys.'  And  you  bet  it  did. 

"We  hadn't  got  halfway  to  Stender's  Spring  till 
Mr.  D.  got  off  to  tighten  his  cinch,  and  then  he  sort 
of  drifted  back  to  where  Hetty  and  I  was.  I  dropped 
back  still  farther  to  where  a  good  chaperone  ought 
to  be  and  he  rode  in  beside  Hetty.  The  trail  was  too 
narrow  then  for  the  rest  to  come  back  after  their  prey, 
so  they  had  to  carry  on  the  rough  work  among  them 
selves. 

"Hetty  acted  perfect.  She  had  a  pensive,  with 
drawn  look — *  aloof,'  I  guess  the  word  is — like  she 
was  too  tender  a  flower,  too  fine  for  this  rough  stuff, 
and  had  ought  to  be  in  the  home  that  minute  telling  a 
fairy  story  to  the  little  ones  gathered  at  her  decently 
clad  knee.  I  don't  know  how  she  done  it,  but  she 
put  that  impression  over.  And  she  tells  Mr.  D. 
that  in  spite  of  her  quiet,  studious  tastes  she  had  re- 


210  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

solved  to  come  on  this  picnic  because  she  loves 
Nature  oh!  so  dearly,  the  birds  and  the  wild  flowers 
and  the  great  rugged  trees  that  have  their  message 
for  man  if  he  will  but  listen  with  an  understanding 
heart — didn't  Mr.  D.  think  so,  or  did  he?  But  not 
too  much  of  this  dear  old  Nature  stuff,  which  can  be 
easy  overdone  with  a  healthy  man;  just  enough  to 
show  there  was  hidden  depths  in  her  nature  that 
every  one  couldn't  find. 

"Then  on  to  silly  questions  about  does  a  horse  lie 
down  when  it  goes  to  sleep  each  night  after  its  hard 
day's  labour,  and  isn't  her  horse's  sash  too  tight,  and 
what  a  pretty  fetlock  he  has,  so  long  and  thick  and 
brown Oh,  do  you  call  that  the  mane?  How  ab 
surd  of  poor  little  me !  Mr.  Daggett  knows  just  every 
thing,  doesn't  he?  He's  perfectly  terrifying.  And 
where  in  the  world  did  he  ever  learn  to  ride  so  stun 
ningly,  like  one  of  those  dare-devils  in  a  Wild  West 
entertainment?  If  her  own  naughty,  naughty  horse 
tries  to  throw  her  on  the  ground  again  where  he  can 
bite  her  she'll  just  have  Mr.  D.  ride  the  nassy  ole 
sing  and  teach  him  better  manners,  so  she  will. 
There  now!  He  must  have  heard  that — just  see 
him  move  his  funny  ears — don't  tell  her  that  horses 
can't  understand  things  that  are  said.  And,  seri 
ously  now,  where  did  Mr.  D.  ever  get  his  superb 
athletic  training,  because,  oh!  how  all  too  rare  it  is 
to  see  a  brain-worker  of  strong  mentality  and  a  splen 
did  athlete  in  one  and  the  same  man.  Oh,  how  pa 
thetically  she  had  wished  and  wished  to  be  a  man  and 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          211 

take  her  place  out  in  the  world  fighting  its  battles, 
instead  of  poor  little  me  who  could  never  be  anything 
but  a  homebody  to  worship  the  great,  strong,  red- 
blooded  men  who  did  the  fighting  and  carried  on 
great  industries — not  even  an  athletic  girl  like  those 
dear  things  up  ahead — and  this  horse  is  bobbing  up 
and  down  like  that  on  purpose,  just  to  make  poor 
little  me  giddy,  and  so  forth.  Holding  her  bridle 
rein  daintily  she  was  with  the  lace  handkerchief  I'd 
give  her  that  cost  me  twelve  fifty. 

"Mr.  D.  took  it  all  like  a  real  man.  He  said  her 
ignorance  of  a  horse  was  adorable  and  laughed 
heartily  at  it.  And  he  smiled  in  a  deeply  modest  and 
masterful  way  and  said  '  But,  really,  that's  nothing — 
nothing  at  all,  I  assure  you/  when  she  said  about 
how  he  was  a  corking  athlete — and  then  kept  still  to 
see  if  she  was  going  on  to  say  more  about  it.  But  she 
didn't,  having  the  God-given  wisdom  to  leave  him 
wanting.  And  then  he  would  be  laughing  again  at 
her  poor-little-me  horse  talk. 

"I  never  had  a  minute's  doubt  after  that,  for  it 
was  the  eyes  of  one  fascinated  to  a  finish  that  he 
turned  back  on  me  half  an  hour  later  as  he  says: 
'Really,  Mrs.  Pettengill,  our  Miss  Hester  is  feminine 
to  her  finger  tips,  is  she  not?'  'She  is,  she  is,'  I 
answers.  'If  you  only  knew  the  trouble  I  had  with 
the  chit  about  that  horrible  old  riding  skirt  of  hers 
when  all  her  girl  friends  are  wearing  a  sensible  cos 
tume!'  Hetty  blushed  good  and  proper  at  this,  not 
knowing  how  indecent  I  might  become,  and  Mr.  D. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

caught  her  at  it.  Aggie  Tuttle  and  Stella  Ballard 
at  this  minute  is  pretending  to  be  shooting  up  a  town 
with  the  couple  of  revolvers  they'd  brought  along 
in  their  cunning  little  holsters.  Mr.  D.  turns  his 
glazed  eyes  to  me  once  more.  'The  real  womanly 
woman,'  says  he  in  a  hushed  voice,  'is  God's  best 
gift  to  man.'  Just  like  that. 

"'Landed!'  I  says  to  myself.  'Throw  him  up  on 
the  bank  and  light  a  fire.' 

"And  mebbe  you  think  this  tet-a-tet  had  not  been 
noticed  by  the  merry  throng  up  front.  Not  so. 
The  shouting  and  songs  had  died  a  natural  death, 
and  the  last  three  miles  of  that  trail  was  covered  in  a 
gloomy  silence,  except  for  the  low  voices  of  Hetty 
and  the  male  she  had  so  neatly  pronged.  I  could  see 
puzzled  glances  cast  back  at  them  and  catch  mutter- 
ings  of  bewilderment  where  the  trail  would  turn  on 
itself.  But  the  poor  young  things  didn't  yet  realize 
that  their  prey  was  hanging  back  there  for  reasons 
over  which  he  hadn't  any  control.  They  thought, 
of  course,  he  was  just  being  polite  or  something. 

"When  we  got  to  the  picnic  place,  though,  they 
soon  saw  that  all  was  not  well.  There  was  some 
resumption  of  the  merrymaking  as  they  dismounted 
and  the  girls  put  one  stirrup  over  the  saddle-horn 
and  eased  the  cinch  like  the  boys  did,  and  proud 
of  their  knowledge,  but  the  glances  they  now  shot 
at  Hetty  wasn't  bewildered  any  more.  They  was 
glances  of  pure  fright.  Hetty,  in  the  first  place, 
had  to  be  lifted  off  her  horse,  and  Mr.  D.  done  it  in 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  213 

a  masterly  way  to  show  her  what  a  mere  feather  she 
was  in  his  giant's  grasp.  Then  with  her  feet  on  the 
ground  she  reeled  a  mite,  so  he  had  to  support  her. 
She  grasped  his  great  strong  arm  firmly  and  says: 
'It's  nothing — I  shall  be  right  presently — leave  me 
please,  go  and  help  those  other  girls.'  They  had 
some  low,  heated  language  about  his  leaving  her  at 
such  a  crisis,  with  her  gripping  his  arm  till  I  bet  it 
showed  for  an  hour.  But  finally  they  broke  and  he 
loosened  her  horse's  sash,  as  she  kept  quaintly  calling 
it,  and  she  recovered  completely  and  said  it  had  been 
but  a  moment's  giddiness  anyway,  and  what  strength 
he  had  in  those  arms,  and  yet  could  use  it  so  gently, 
and  he  said  she  was  a  brave,  game  little  woman, 
and  the  picnic  was  served  to  one  and  all,  with  looks 
of  hearty  suspicion  and  rage  now  being  shot  at  Hetty 
from  every  other  girl  there. 

"And  now  I  see  that  my  hunch  has  been  even 
better  than  I  thought.  Not  only  does  the  star  male 
hover  about  Hetty,  cutely  perched  on  a  fallen  log 
with  her  dainty,  gleaming  ankles  crossed,  and  looking 
so  fresh  and  nifty  and  feminine,  but  I'm  darned  if 
three  or  four  of  the  other  males  don't  catch  the  con 
tagion  of  her  woman's  presence  and  hang  round  her, 
too,  fetching  her  food  of  every  kind  there,  feeding 
her  spoonfuls  of  Aggie  Tuttle's  plum  preserves,  and 
all  like  that,  one  comical  thing  after  another.  Yes, 
sir;  here  was  Mac  Gordon  and  Riley  Hardin  and 
Charlie  Dickman  and  Roth  Hyde,  men  about  town 
of  the  younger  dancing  set,  that  had  knowed  Hetty 


214  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

for  years  and  hardly  ever  looked  at  her — here  they 
was  paying  attentions  to  her  now  like  she  was  some 
prize  beauty,  come  down  from  Spokane  for  over 
Sunday,  to  say  nothing  of  Mr.  D.,  who  hardly  ever 
left  her  side  except  to  get  her  another  sardine  sand 
wich  or  a  paper  cup  of  coffee.  It  was  then  I  see  the 
scientific  explanation  of  it,  like  these  high-school 
professors  always  say  that  science  is  at  the  bottom  of 
everything.  The  science  of  this  here  was  that  they 
was  all  devoting  themselves  to  Hetty  for  the  simple 
reason  that  she  was  the  one  and  only  woman  there 
present. 

"Of  course  these  girls  in  their  modest  Non  Plush 
Ultras  didn't  get  the  scientific  secret  of  this  fact. 
They  was  still  too  obsessed  with  the  idea  that  they 
ought  to  be  ogled  on  account  of  them  by  any  male 
beast  in  his  right  senses.  But  they  knew  they'd 
got  in  wrong  somehow.  By  this  time  they  was  kind 
of  bunching  together  and  telling  each  other  things  in 
low  tones,  while  not  seeming  to  look  at  Hetty  and 
her  dupes,  at  which  all  would  giggle  in  the  most 
venemous  manner.  Daisy  Estelle  left  the  bunch 
once  and  made  a  coy  bid  for  the  notice  of  Mr.  D. 
by  snatching  his  cap  and  running  merrily  off  with  it 
about  six  feet.  If  there  was  any  one  in  the  world — 
except  Hetty — could  make  a  man  hate  the  idea  of 
riding  pants  for  women,  she  was  it.  I  could  see 
the  cold,  flinty  look  come  into  his  eyes  as  he  turned 
away  from  her  to  Hetty  with  the  pitcher  of  lemonade. 
And  then  Beryl  Mae  Macomber,  she  gets  over  close 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          215 

enough  for  Mr.  D.  to  hear  it,  and  says  conditions  is 
made  very  inharmonious  at  home  for  a  girl  of  her 
temperament,  and  she's  just  liable  any  minute  to 
chuck  everything  and  either  take  up  literary  work 
or  go  into  the  movies,  she  don't  know  which  and 
don't  care — all  kind  of  desperate  so  Mr.  D.  will  feel 
alarmed  about  a  beautiful  young  thing  like  that  out 
in  the  world  alone  and  unprotected  and  at  the  mercy 
of  every  designing  scoundrel.  But  I  don't  think 
Mr.  D.  hears  a  word  of  it,  he's  so  intently  listening  to 
Hetty  who  says  here  in  this  beautiful  mountain  glade 
where  all  is  peace  how  one  can't  scarcely  believe  that 
there  is  any  evil  in  the  world  anywhere,  and  what  a 
difference  it  does  make  when  one  comes  to  see  life 
truly.  Then  she  crossed  and  recrossed  her  silken 
ankles,  slightly  adjusted  her  daring  tan  skirt,  and 
raised  her  eyes  wistfully  to  the  treetops,  and  I  bet 
there  wasn't  a  man  there  didn't  feel  that  she  belonged 
in  the  home  circle  with  the  little  ones  gathered  about, 
telling  'em  an  awfully  exciting  story  about  the 
naughty,  naughty,  bad  little  white  kitten  and  the 
ball  of  mamma's  yarn. 

"Yes,  sir;  Hetty  was  as  much  of  a  revelation  to 
me  in  one  way  as  she  would  of  been  to  that  party 
in  another  if  I  hadn't  saved  her  from  it.  She  must 
have  had  the  correct  female  instinct  all  these  years, 
only  no  one  had  ever  started  her  before  on  a  track 
where  there  was  no  other  entries.  With  those  other 
girls  dressed  like  she  was  Hetty  would  of  been  leaning 
over  some  one's  shoulder  to  fork  up  her  own  sand- 


216  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

wiches,  and  no  one  taking  hardly  any  notice  whether 
she'd  had  some  of  the  hot  coffee  or  whether  she  hadn't. 
And  the  looks  she  got  throughout  the  afternoon! 
Say,  I  wouldn't  of  trusted  that  girl  at  the  edge  of  a 
cliff  with  a  single  pair  of  those  No.  9872's  anywhere 
near. 

"After  the  lunch  things  was  packed  up  there  was 
faint  attempts  at  fun  and  frolic  with  songs  and  chorus 
— Riley  Hardin  has  a  magnificent  bass  voice  at  times 
and  Mac  Gordon  and  Charlie  Dickman  and  Roth 
Hyde  wouldn't  be  so  bad  if  they'd  let  these  Turkish 
cigarettes  alone — and  the  boys  got  together  and  sung 
some  of  their  good  old  business-college  songs,  with 
the  girls  coming  in  while  they  murdered  Hetty  with 
their  beautiful  eyes.  But  Hetty  and  Mr.  D.  sort 
of  withdrew  from  the  noisy  enjoyment  and  talked 
about  the  serious  aspects  of  life  and  how  one  could 
get  along  almost  any  place  if  only  they  had  their 
favourite  authors.  And  Mr.  D.  says  doesn't  she 
sing  at  all,  and  she  says,  Oh!  in  a  way;  that  her  voice 
has  a  certain  parlour  charm,  she  has  been  told,  and 
she  sings  at — you  can't  really  call  it  singing — two  or 
three  of  the  old  Scotch  songs  of  homely  sentiment  like 
the  Scotch  seem  to  get  into  their  songs  as  no  other 
nation  can,  or  doesn't  he  think  so/and  he  does,  indeed. 
And  he's  reading  a  wonderful  new  novel  in  which 
there  is  much  of  Nature  with  its  lessons  for  each  of  us, 
but  in  which  love  conquers  all  at  the  end,  and  the 
girl  in  it  reminds  him  strongly  of  her,  and  perhaps 
she'll  be  good  enough  to  sing  for  him — just  for  him 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  217 

alone  in  the  dusk — if  he  brings  this  book  up  to 
morrow  night  so  he  can  show  her  some  good  places 
in  it. 

"At  first  she  is  sure  she  has  a  horrid  old  engage 
ment  for  to-morrow  night  and  is  so  sorry,  but  an 
other  time,  perhaps Ain't  it  a  marvel  the 

crooked  tricks  that  girl  had  learned  in  one  day !  And 
then  she  remembers  that  her  engagement  is  for  Tues 
day  night — what  could  she  have  been  thinking  of! — 
and  come  by  all  means — only  too  charmed — and 
how  rarely  nowadays  does  one  meet  one  on  one's 
own  level  of  culture,  or  perhaps  that  is  too  awful  a 
word  to  use — so  hackneyed — but  anyway  he  knows 
what  she  means,  or  doesn't  he?  He  does. 

"Pretty  soon  she  gets  up  and  goes  over  to  her 
horse,  picking  her  way  daintily  in  the  silly  little  tan 
pumps,  and  seems  to  be  offering  the  beast  something. 
The  stricken  man  follows  her  the  second  he  can  with 
out  being  too  raw  about  it,  and  there  is  the  adorably 
feminine  thing  with  a  big  dill  pickle,  two  deviled 
eggs,  and  a  half  of  one  of  these  Camelbert  cheeses  for 
her  horse.  Mr.  D.  has  a  good  masterly  laugh  at  her 
idea  of  horse  fodder  and  calls  her  'But,  my  dear 
child ! '  and  she  looks  prettily  offended  and  offers  this 
chuck  to  the  horse  and  he  gulps  it  all  down  and  noses 
round  for  more  of  the  same.  It  was  an  old  horse 
named  Croppy  that  she'd  known  from  childhood  and 
would  eat  anything  on  earth.  She  rode  him  up  here 
once  and  he  nabbed  a  bar  of  laundry  soap  off  the 
back  porch  and  chewed  the  whole  thing  down  with 


218          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

tears  of  ecstasy  in  his  eyes  and  frothing  at  the  mouth 
like  a  mad  dog.  Well,  so  Hetty  gives  mister  man  a 
look  of  dainty  superiority  as  she  flicks  crumbs  from 
her  white  fingers  with  my  real  lace  handkerchief, 
and  he  stops  his  hearty  laughter  and  just  stares,  and 
she  says  what  nonsense  to  think  the  poor  horses  don't 
like  food  as  well  as  any  one.  Them  little  moments 
have  their  effect  on  a  man  in  a  certain  condition. 
He  knew  there  probably  wasn't  another  horse  in  the 
world  would  touch  that  truck,  but  he  couldn't 
help  feeling  a  strange  new  respect  for  her  in  addition 
to  that  glorious  masculine  protection  she'd  had  him 
wallowing  in  all  day. 

"The  ride  home,  at  least  on  the  part  of  the  Non 
Plush  Ultra  cut-ups,  was  like  they  had  laid  a  loved 
one  to  final  rest  out  there  on  the  lone  mountainside. 
The  handsome  stranger  and  Hetty  brought  up  the 
rear,  conversing  eagerly  about  themselves  and  other 
serious  topics.  I  believe  he  give  her  to  understand 
that  he'd  been  pretty  wild  at  one  time  in  his  life  and 
wasn't  any  too  darned  well  over  it  yet,  but  that  some 
good  womanly  woman  who  would  study  his  ways 
could  still  take  him  and  make  a  man  of  him;  and  her 
answering  that  she  knew  he  must  have  suffered  be 
yond  human  endurance  in  that  horrible  conflict  with 
his  lower  nature.  He  said  he  had. 

"Of  course  the  rabid  young  hoydens  up  ahead  made 
a  feeble  effort  now  and  then  to  carry  it  off  lightly,  and 
from  time  to  time  sang  'My  Bonnie  Lies  Over  the 
Ocean,'  or  'Merrily  We  Roll  Along,'  with  the  high, 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          219 

squeaky  tenor  of  Roth  Hyde  sounding  above  the 
others  very  pretty  in  the  moonlight,  but  it  was  poor 
work  as  far  as  these  enraged  vestals  was  concerned. 
If  I'd  been  Hetty  and  had  got  a  strange  box  of  candy 
through  the  mail  the  next  week,  directed  in  a  dis 
guised  woman's  hand,  I'd  of  rushed  right  off  to  the 
police  with  it,  not  waiting  for  any  analysis.  And 
she,  poor  thing,  would  get  so  frightened  at  bad  spots, 
with  the  fierce  old  horse  bobbing  about  so  dangerous, 
that  she  just  has  to  be  held  on.  And  once  she 
wrenched  her  ankle  against  a  horrid  old  tree  on  the 
trail — she  hadn't  been  able  to  resist  a  little  one — and 
bit  her  under  lip  as  the  spasm  of  pain  passed  over  her 
refined  features.  But  she  was  all  right  in  a  minute 
and  begged  Mr.  D.  not  to  think  of  bathing  it  in  cold 
water  because  it  was  nothing — nothing  at  all,  really 
now — and  he  would  embarrass  her  frightfully  if  he 
said  one  more  word  about  it.  And  Mr.  D.  again 
remarked  that  she  was  feminine  to  her  finger  tips,  a 
brave,  game  little  woman,  one  of  the  gamest  he  ever 
knew.  And  pretty  soon — what  was  she  thinking 
about  now?  Why,  she  was  merely  wondering  if 
horses  think  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word  or  only  have 
animal  instinct,  as  it  is  called.  And  wasn't  she  a 
strange,  puzzling  creature  to  be  thinking  on  deep 
subjects  like  that  at  such  a  time !  Yes,  she  had  been 
called  puzzling  as  a  child,  but  she  didn't  like  it  one 
bit.  She  wanted  to  be  like  other  girls,  if  he  knew 
what  she  meant.  He  seemed  to. 

"They  took  Hetty  home  first  on  account  of  her 


220  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

poor  little  ankle  and  sung  'Good  Night,  Ladies,'  at  the 
gate.  And  so  ended  a  day  that  was  wreck  and  ruin 
for  most  of  our  sex  there  present. 

"And  to  show  you  what  a  good,  deep,  scientific 
cause  I  had  discovered,  the  next  night  at  Hetty's 
who  shows  up  one  by  one  but  these  four  men  about 
town,  each  with  a  pound  of  mixed  from  the  Bon  Ton 
Kandy  Kitchen,  and  there  they're  all  setting  at  the 
feet  of  Hetty,  as  it  were,  in  her  new  light  summer 
gown  with  the  blue  bows,  when  Mr.  D.  blows  in  with 
a  two-pound  box  and  the  novel  in  which  love  con 
quered  all.  So  excited  she  was  when  she  tells  me 
about  it  next  day.  The  luck  of  that  girl !  But  after 
all  it  wasn't  luck,  because  she'd  laid  her  foundations 
the  day  before,  hadn't  she?  Always  look  a  little  bit 
back  of  anything  that  seems  to  be  luck,  say  I. 

"And  Hetty  with  shining  eyes  entertained  one  and 
all  with  the  wit  and  sparkle  a  woman  can  show  only 
when  there's  four  or  five  men  at  her  at  once — it's 
the  only  time  we  ever  rise  to  our  best.  But  she  got  a 
chance  for  a  few  words  alone  with  Mr.  D.,  who  took 
his  hat  finally  when  he  sees  the  other  four  was  going 
to  set  him  out;  enough  words  to  confide  to  him  how 
she  loathed  this  continual  social  racket  to  which  she 
was  constantly  subjected,  with  never  a  let-up  so  one 
could  get  to  one's  books  and  to  one's  real  thoughts. 
But  perhaps  he  would  venture  up  again  some  time 
next  week  or  the  week  after — not  getting  coarse  in 
her  work,  understand,  even  with  him  flopping  around 
there  out  on  the  bank — and  he  give  her  one  long, 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

meaning  look  and  said  why  not  to-morrow  night, 
and  she  carelessly  said  that  would  be  charming,  she 
was  sure — she  didn't  think  of  any  engagement  at  this 
minute — and  it  was  ever  so  nice  of  him  to  think  of 
poor  little  me. 

"Then  she  went  back  and  gave  the  social  evening 
of  their  life  to  them  four  boys  that  had  stayed.  She 
said  she  couldn't  thank  them  enough  for  coming  this 
evening — which  is  probably  the  only  time  she  had 
told  the  truth  in  thirty-six  hours — and  they  all  made 
merry.  Roth  Hyde  sang  'Sally  in  Our  Alley'  so  good 
on  the  high  notes  that  the  Duttons  was  all  out  in  the 
hall  listening; and  Riley  Hardin  singing  'Down,  Diver, 
Down,  'Neath  the  Deep  Blue  Waves!'  and  Mac 
Gordon  singing  his  everlasting  German  songs  in  their 
native  language,  and  Charlie  Dickman  singing  a  new 
sentimental  one  called  'Ain't  There  at  Least  One 
Gentleman  Here?'  about  a  fair  young  lady  dancer 
being  insulted  in  a  gilded  cafe  in  some  large  city; 
and  one  and  all  voted  it  was  a  jolly  evening  and  said 
how  about  coming  back  to-morrow  night,  but  Hetty 
said  no,  it  was  her  one  evening  for  study  and  she 
couldn't  be  bothered  with  them,  which  was  a  plain, 
downright  so-and-so  and  well  she  knew  it,  because 
that  girl's  study  was  over  for  good  and  all. 

"Well,  why  string  it  out?  I've  give  you  the  facts. 
And  my  lands!  Will  you  look  at  that  clock  now? 
Here's  the  morning  gone  and  this  room  still  looking 
like  the  inside  of  a  sheep-herder's  wagon!  Oh,  yes, 
and  when  Hetty  was  up  here  this  time  that  she 


222  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

wouldn't  wear  my  riding  pants  down,  she  says, 
'Not  only  that,  but  I'm  scrupulously  careful  in  all 
ways.  Why,  I  never  even  allow  dear  Burchell  to 
observe  me  in  one  of  those  lace  boudoir  caps  that  so 
many  women  cover  up  their  hair  with  when  it's  their 
best  feature  but  they  won't  take  time  to  do  it.' 

"Now  was  that  spoken  like  a  wise  woman  or  like 
the  two-horned  Galumpsis  Caladensis  of  East  India, 
whose  habits  are  little  known  to  man?  My  Lord! 
Won't  I  ever  learn  to  stop?  Where  did  I  put  that 
dusting  cloth?" 


VI 
COUSIN  EGBERT  INTERVENES 

IT  TAKES  all  kinds  of  foreigners  to  make  a 
world,"  said  Ma  Pettengill — irrelevantly  I 
thought,  because  the  remark  seemed  to  be  in 
spired  merely  by  the  announcement  of  Sandy  Saw- 
telle  that  the  mule  Jerry's  hip  had  been  laid  open  by  a 
kick  from  the  mule  Alice,  and  that  the  bearer  of  the 
news  had  found  fourteen  stitches  needed  to  mend  the 
rent. 

Sandy  brought  his  news  to  the  owner  of  the  Arrow 
head  as  she  relaxed  in  my  company  on  the  west  ve 
randa  of  the  ranch  house  and  scented  the  golden  dusk 
with  burning  tobacco  of  an  inferior  but  popular 
brand.  I  listened  but  idly  to  the  minute  details  of 
the  catastrophe,  discovering  more  entertainment  in 
the  solemn  wake  of  light  a  dulled  sun  was  leaving  as  it 
slipped  over  the  sagging  rim  of  Arrowhead  Pass. 
And  yet,  through  my  absorption  with  the  shadows 
that  now  played  far  off  among  the  folded  hills,  there 
did  come  sharply  the  impression  that  this  Sawtelle  per 
son  was  dwelling  too  insistently  upon  the  precise  num 
ber  of  stitches  required  by  the  breach  in  Jerry's  hide. 

"Fourteen — yes,  ma'am;  fourteen  stitches.  That 
there  Alice  mule  sure  needs  handling.  Fourteen 

223 


224  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

regular  ones.  I'd  certainly  show  her  where  to  head 
in  at,  like  now  she  was  my  personal  property.  Me, 
I'd  abuse  her  shamefully.  Only  eleven  I  took  last 
time  in  poor  old  Jerry ;  and  here  now  it's  plumb  four 
teen — yes,  ma'am;  fourteen  good  ones.  Say,  you 
get  fourteen  of  them  stitches  in  your  hide,  and  I  bet — 
thought,  at  first,  I  could  make  twelve  do,  but  it  takes 
full  fourteen,  with  old  Jerry  nearly  tearing  the  chute 
down  while  I  was  taking  these  fourteen " 

I  began  to  see  numbers  black  against  that  glowing 
panorama  in  the  west.  A  monstrous  14  repeated  it 
self  stubbornly  along  the  gorgeous  reach  of  it. 

"Yes,  ma'am — fourteen;  you  can  go  out  right  now 
and  count  'em  yourself.  And  like  mebbe  I'll  have  to 
go  down  to  town  to-morrow  fur  some  more  of  that 
King  of  Pain  Liniment,  on  account  of  Lazarus  and 
Bryan  getting  good  and  lamed  in  this  same  mix-up, 
and  me  letting  fall  the  last  bottle  we  had  on  the  place 
and  busting  her  wide  open " 

"Don't  you  bother  to  bust  any  more!"  broke  in  his 
employer  in  a  tone  that  I  found  crisp  with  warning. 
"There's  a  whole  new  case  of  King  of  Pain  in  the 
storeroom." 

"Huh! "  exclaimed  the  surgeon,  ably  conveying  dis 
appointment  thereby.  "And  like  now  if  I  did  go 
down  I  could  get  the  new  parts  for  that  there 
mower " 

"That's  something  for  me  to  worry  about  ex 
clusively.  I'll  begin  when  we  got  something  to 
mow."  There  was  finished  coldness  in  this. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  225 

"Huh!"  The  primitive  vocable  now  conveyed  a 
lively  resentment,  but  there  was  the  pleading  of  a 
patient  sufferer  in  what  followed.  "And  like  at  the 
same  time,  having  to  make  the  trip  anyway  for  these 
here  supplies  and  things,  I  could  stop  just  a  minute  at 
Doc  Martingale's  and  have  this  old  tooth  of  mine 
took  out,  that's  been  achin'  like  a  knife  stuck  in  me 
fur  the  last  fourteen — well,  fur  about  a  week  now — 
achin'  night  and  day — no  sleep  at  all  now  fur  seven, 
eight  nights;  so  painful  I  get  regular  delirious,  let  me 
tell  you.  And,  of  course,  all  wore  out  the  way  I  am,  I 
won't  be  any  good  on  the  place  till  my  agony's  re 
lieved.  Why,  what  with  me  suffering  so  horrible,  I 
just  wouldn't  hardly  know  my  own  name  sometimes 
if  you  was  to  come  up  and  ask  me!" 

The  woman's  tone  became  more  than  ever  repellent. 

"Never  you  mind  about  not  knowing  your  own 
name.  I  got  it  on  the  pay  roll,  and  it'll  still  be  there 
to-morrow  if  you're  helping  Buck  get  out  the  rest  of 
them  fence  posts  like  I  told  you.  If  you  happen  to 
get  stuck  for  your  name  when  I  ain't  round,  and  the 
inquiring  parties  won't  wait,  just  ask  the  Chinaman; 
he  never  forgets  anything  he's  learned  once.  Or  I'll 
write  it  out  on  a  card,  so  you  can  show  it  to  anybody 
who  rides  up  and  wants  to  know  it  in  a  hurry!" 

"Huh!" 

The  powers  of  this  brief  utterance  had  not  yet  been 
exhausted.  It  now  conveyed  despair.  With  bowed 
head  the  speaker  dully  turned  and  withdrew  from  our 
presence.  As  he  went  I  distinctly  heard  him  mutter: 


226  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"Huh!  Four-teen!  Four-teen!  And  seven!  And 
twenty-eight!" 

"Say,  there!"  his  callous  employer  called  after 
him.  "  Why  don't  you  get  Boogies  to  embroider  that 
name  of  yours  on  the  front  of  your  shirt?  He'd  adore 
to  do  it.  And  you  can  still  read,  can't  you,  in  the 
midst  of  your  agonies?" 

There  was  no  response  to  this  taunt.  The  suffer 
ing  one  faded  slowly  down  the  path  to  the  bunk  house 
and  was  lost  in  its  blackness.  A  light  shone  out  and 
presently  came  sombre  chords  from  a  guitar,  followed 
by  the  voice  of  Sandy  in  gloomy  song:  "There's  a 
broken  heart  for  every  light  on  Broadway " 

'I  was  not  a  little  pained  to  discover  this  unsus 
pected  vein  of  cruelty  in  a  woman  I  had  long  ad 
mired.  And  the  woman  merely  became  irrelevant 
with  her  apothegm  about  foreigners.  I  ignored 
it. 

"What  about  that  sufferer  down  there  in  the  bunk 
house? "  I  demanded.  "Didn't  you  ever  have  tooth 
ache?" 

"No;  neither  did  Sandy  Sawtelle.  He  ain't  a 
sufferer;  he's  just  a  liar," 

"Why?" 

"So  I'll  let  him  go  to  town  and  play  the  number  of 
them  stitches  on  the  wheel.  Sure!  He'd  run  a 
horse  to  death  getting  there,  make  for  the  back  room 
of  the  Turf  Club  Saloon,  where  they  run  games 
whenever  the  town  ain't  lidded  too  tight,  and  play 
roulette  till  either  him  or  the  game  had  to  close  down. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Yes,  sir;  he'd  string  his  bets  along  on  fourteen  and 
seven  and  twenty-eight  and  thirty-five,  and  if  he 
didn't  make  a  killing  he'd  believe  all  his  life  that  the 
wheel  was  crooked.  Stitches  in  a  mule's  hide  is  his 
bug.  He  could  stitch  up  any  horse  on  the  place  and 

never  have  the  least  hunch;  but  let  it  be  a  mule 

Say !  Down  there  right  now  he's  thinking  about  the 
thousand  dollars  or  so  I'm  keeping  him  out  of.  I 
judge  from  his  song  that  he'd  figured  on  a  trip  East  to 
New  York  City  or  Denver.  At  that,  I  don't  know  as 
I  blame  him.  Yes,  sir;  that's  what  reminded  me  of 
foreigners  and  bazaars  and  vice,  and  so  on — and  poor 
Egbert  Floud." 

My  hostess  drew  about  her  impressive  shoulders  a 
blanket  of  Indian  weave  that  dulled  the  splendours  of 
the  western  sky,  and  rolled  a  slender  cigarette  from 
the  tobacco  and  papers  at  her  side.  By  the  ensuing 
flame  of  a  match  I  saw  that  her  eyes  gleamed  with  the 
light  of  pure  narration. 

"Foreigners,  bazaars,  vice,  and  Egbert  Floud?"  I 
murmured,  wishing  these  to  be  related  more  plausibly 
one  to  another. 

"I'm  coming  to  it,"  said  the  lady;  and,  after  two 
sustaining  inhalations  from  the  new  cigarette,  forth 
with  she  did: 

It  was  late  last  winter,  while  I  was  still  in  Red  Gap. 
The  talk  went  round  that  we'd  ought  to  have  another 
something  for  the  Belgians.  We'd  had  a  concert,  the 
proceeds  of  which  run  up  into  two  figures  after  all  ex- 


228  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

penses  was  paid ;  but  it  was  felt  something  more  could 
be  done — something  in  the  nature  of  a  bazaar,  where 
all  could  get  together.  The  Mes-dames  Henrietta 
Templeton  Price  and  Judge  Ballard  were  appointed  a 
committee  to  do  some  advance  scouting. 

That  was  where  Egbert  Floud  come  in,  though 
after  it  was  all  over  any  one  could  see  that  he  was 
more  to  be  pitied  than  censured.  These  well-known 
leaders  consulted  him  among  others,  and  Cousin 
Egbert  says  right  off  that,  sure,  he'll  help  'em  get  up 
something  if  they'll  agree  to  spend  a  third  of  the  loot 
for  tobacco  for  the  poor  soldiers,  because  a  Belgian  or 
any  one  else  don't  worry  so  much  about  going  hungry 
if  they  can  have  a  smoke  from  time  to  time,  and  he's 
been  reading  about  where  tobacco  is  sorely  needed  in 
the  trenches.  He  felt  strong  about  it,  because  one 
time  out  on  the  trail  he  lost  all  his  own  and  had  to 
smoke  poplar  bark  or  something  for  two  weeks,  nearly 
burning  his  flues  out. 

The  two  Mes-dames  agreed  to  this,  knowing  from 
their  menfolk  that  tobacco  is  one  of  the  great  human 
needs,  both  in  war  and  in  peace,  and  knowing  that 
Cousin  Egbert  will  be  sure  to  donate  handsomely 
himself,  he  always  having  been  the  easiest  mark  in 
town;  so  they  said  they  was  much  obliged  for  his 
timely  suggestion  and  would  he  think  up  some  novel 
feature  for  the  bazaar;  and  he  said  he  would  if  he 
could,  and  they  went  on  to  other  men  of  influence. 

Henrietta's  husband,  when  he  heard  the  money 
wouldn't  all  be  spent  for  mere  food,  said  he'd  put  up  a 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  229 

choice  lot  in  Price's  Addition  to  be  raffled  off — a  lot 
that  would  at  some  future  date  be  worth  five  thou 
sand  dollars  of  anybody's  money,  and  that  was  all 
right;  and  some  of  the  merchants  come  through  lib 
eral  with  articles  of  use  and  adornment  to  be  took 
chances  on. 

Even  old  Proctor  Knapp,  the  richest  man  in  town, 
actually  give  up  something  after  they  pestered  him 
for  an  hour.  He  owns  the  People's  Traction  Com 
pany  and  he  turned  over  a  dollar's  worth  of  street-car 
tickets  to  be  raffled  for,  though  saying  he  regarded 
gambling  as  a  very  objectionable  and  uncertain  vice, 
and  a  person  shouldn't  go  into  anything  without 
being  sure  they  was  dead  certain  to  make  something 
out  of  it,  war  or  no  war,  he  knowing  all  about  it. 
Why  wouldn't  he,  having  started  life  as  a  poor,  ragged 
boy  and  working  his  way  up  to  where  parties  that 
know  him  is  always  very  careful  indeed  when  they  do 
any  business  with  him? 

Some  of  the  ladies  they  consulted  was  hostile  about 
the  tobacco  end  of  it.  Mrs.  Tracy  Bangs  said  that 
no  victim  of  the  weed  could  keep  up  his  mentality, 
and  that  she,  for  one,  would  rather  see  her  Tracy  lying 
in  his  casket  than  smoking  vile  tobacco  that  would 
destroy  his  intellect  and  make  him  a  loathsome  object 
in  the  home.  She  said  she  knew  perfectly  well  that  if 
the  countries  at  war  had  picked  their  soldiers  from 
non-smokers  it  would  have  been  all  over  in  just  a  few 
days — and  didn't  that  show  you  that  the  tobacco 
demon  was  as  bad  as  the  rum  demon? 


230          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Mrs.  Leonard  Wales  was  not  only  bitter  about  to 
bacco  but  about  any  help  at  all.  She  said  our  hard 
storms  of  that  winter  had  been  caused  by  the  general 
hatred  in  Europe  which  created  evil  waves  of  ma 
lignity;  so  let  'em  shoot  each  other  till  they  got  sense 
enough  to  dwell  together  in  love  and  amity — only  we 
shouldn't  prolong  the  war  by  sending  'em  soup  and 
cigarettes,  and  so  on.  Her  idea  seemed  to  be  that  if 
Red  Gap  would  just  stand  firm  in  the  matter  the  war 
would  die  a  natural  death.  Still,  if  a  bazaar  was 
really  going  to  be  held,  she  would  consent  to  pose  in  a 
tableau  if  they  insisted  on  it,  and  mebbe  she  could 
thus  inject  into  the  evil  atmosphere  of  Europe  some 
of  the  peace  and  good  will  that  sets  the  United  States 
apart  from  other  nations. 

Trust  Cora  Wales  not  to  overlook  a  bet  like  that. 
She's  a  tall,  sandy-haired  party,  with  very  extrava 
gant  contours,  and  the  thing  she  loves  best  on  earth 
is  to  get  under  a  pasteboard  crown,  with  gilt  stars  on 
it,  and  drape  herself  in  the  flag  of  her  country,  with 
one  fat  arm  bare,  while  Maine,  New  Hampshire, 
Vermont,  Massachusetts,  and  the  rest  is  gathered 
about  and  looking  up  to  her  for  protection.  Mebbe 
she  don't  look  so  bad  as  the  Goddess  of  Liberty  on  a 
float  in  the  middle  of  one  of  our  wide  streets  when  the 
Chamber  of  Commerce  is  giving  a  Greater  Red  Gap 
pageant;  but  take  her  in  a  hall,  where  you  set  close 
up  to  the  platform,  and  she  looks  more  like  our 
boasted  liberty  has  degenerated  into  license,  or  some 
thing  like  that.  Anyway,  the  committee  had  to 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  231 

promise  her  she  could  do  something  in  her  flag  and 
crown  and  talcum  powder,  because  they  knew  she'd 
knock  the  show  if  they  didn't. 

This  reminded  'em  they  had  to  have  a  program  of 
entertainment;  so  they  got  me  on  the  committee  with 
the  other  Mes-dames  to  think  up  things,  me  always 
being  an  easy  mark.  I  find  out  right  off  that  we're  a 
lot  of  foreigners  and  you  got  to  be  darned  careful  not  to 
hurt  anybody's  feelings.  Little  Bertha  Lehman's  pa 
would  let  her  be  a  state — Colorado  or  Nebraska,  or 
something — but  he  wouldn't  let  her  sing  unless  it  would 
be  a  German  song  in  the  original;  and  Hobbs,  the  Eng 
lish  baker,  said  his  Tillie  would  have  to  sing  "  Britannia 
Rules  the  Waves,"  or  nothing;  and  two  or  three  others 
said  what  they  would  and  wouldn't  do,  and  it  looked 
like  Red  Gap  itself  was  going  to  be  dug  up  into  trenches. 
I  had  to  get  little  Magnesia  Waterman,  daughter  of  the 
coons  that  work  in  the  U.  S.  Grill,  to  do  the  main 
singing.  She  seemed  to  be  about  the  only  American 
child  soprano  we  had.  She  sings  right  well  for  a  kid, 
mostly  these  sad  songs  about  heaven;  but  we  picked 
out  a  good  live  one  for  her  that  seemed  to  be  neu 
tral. 

It  was  delicate  work,  let  me  tell  you,  turning  down 
folks  that  wanted  to  sing  patriotic  songs  or  recite  war 
poetry  that  would  be  sure  to  start  something,  with  Pro 
fessor  Gluckstein  wishing  to  get  up  and  tell  how  the 
cowardly  British  had  left  the  crew  of  a  German  sub 
marine  to  perish  after  shooting  it  up  when  it  was  only 
trying  to  sink  their  cruiser  by  fair  and  lawful  meth- 


232  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

ods;  and  Henry  Lehman  wanting  to  read  a  piece  from 
a  German  newspaper  about  how  the  United  States  was 
a  nation  of  vile  money-grubbers  that  would  sell  ammu 
nition  to  the  enemy  just  because  they  had  the  ships  to 
take  it  away,  and  wouldn't  sell  a  dollar's  worth  to  the 
Fatherland,  showing  we  had  been  bought  up  by 
British  gold — and  so  on. 

But  I  kept  neutral.  I  even  turned  down  an 
Englishman  named  Ruggles,  that  keeps  the  U.  S. 
Grill  and  is  well  thought  of,  though  he  swore  that  all 
he  would  do  was  to  get  off  a  few  comical  riddles,  and 
such.  He'd  just  got  a  new  one  that  goes :  "  Why  is  an 
elephant  like  a  corkscrew?  Because  there's  a  *b'  in 
both."  I  didn't  see  it  at  first,  till  he  explained  with 
hearty  laughter — because  there's  a  "b"  in  both — the 
word  "both."  See?  Of  course  there's  no  sense  to  it. 
He  admitted  there  wasn't,  but  said  it  was  a  jolly 
wheeze  just  the  same.  I  might  have  took  a  chance 
with  him,  but  he  went  on  to  say  that  he'd  sent  this 
wheeze  to  the  brave  lads  in  the  trenches,  along  with  a 
lot  of  cigars  and  tobacco,  and  had  got  about  fifty  post 
cards  from  'em  saying  it  was  the  funniest  thing  they'd 
heard  since  the  war  begun.  And  in  a  minute  more 
he  was  explaining,  with  much  feeling,  just  what  low- 
down  nation  it  was  that  started  the  war — it  not  being 
England,  by  any  means — and  I  saw  he  wasn't  to  be 
trusted  on  his  feet. 

So  I  smoothed  him  down  till  he  promised  to  donate 
all  the  lemonade  for  Aggie  Tuttle,  who  was  to  be 
Rebekkah  at  the  Well;  and  I  smoothed  Henry  Leh- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          233 

man  till  he  said  he'd  let  his  folks  come  and  buy 
chances  on  things,  even  if  the  country  was  getting 
overrun  by  foreigners,  with  an  Italian  barber  shop 
just  opened  in  the  same  block  with  his  sanitary  shav 
ing  parlour;  though — thank  goodness — the  Italian 
hadn't  had  much  to  do  yet  but  play  on  a  mandolin. 
And  I  smoothed  Professor  Gluckstein  down  till  he 
agreed  to  furnish  the  music  for  us  and  let  the  war  take 
care  of  itself. 

The  Prof's  a  good  old  scout  when  he  ain't  got  his 
war  bonnet  on.  He  was  darned  near  crying  into  his 
meerschaum  pipe  with  a  carved  fat  lady  on  it  when  I 
got  through  telling  him  about  the  poor  soldiers  in  the 
wet  and  cold  without  a  thing  to  smoke.  He  says: 
"You're  right,  madam;  with  Jake  Frost  in  the 
trenches  and  no  tobacco,  all  men  should  be  brothers 
under  then-  hides."  And  I  got  that  printed  in  the 
Recorder  for  a  slogan,  and  other  foreigners  come  into 
line;  an.d  things  looked  pretty  good. 

Also,  I  got  Doc  Sulloway,  who  happened  to  be  in 
town,  to  promise  he'd  come  and  tell  some  funny 
anecdotes.  He  ain't  a  regular  doctor — he  just  took 
it  up ;  a  guy  with  long  black  curls  and  a  big  moustache 
and  a  big  hat  and  diamond  pin,  that  goes  round 
selling  Indian  Snake  Oil  off  a  wagon.  Doc  said  he'd 
have  his  musician,  Ed  Bemis,  come,  too.  He  said 
Ed  was  known  far  and  wide  as  the  world's  challenge 
cornetijst.  I  says  all  right,  if  he'fl  play  something 
neutral;  and  Doc  says  he'll  play  "Listen  to  the 
Mocking  Bird,"  with  variations,  and  play  it  so 


£34  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

swell  you'll  think  you're  perched  right  up  in  the 
treetops  listening  to  Nature's  own  feathered  song, 
sters. 

That  about  made  up  my  show,  including,  of  course, 
the  Spanish  dance  by  Beryl  Mae  Maconiber.  Red 
Gap  always  expects  that  and  Beryl  Mae  never  dis 
appoints  'em — makes  no  difference  what  the  oc 
casion  is.  Mebbe  it's  an  Evening  with  Shakespeare, 
or  the  Landing  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers,  or  that 
Oratorio  by  Elijah  somebody,  but  Beryl  Mae  is  right 
there  with  her  girlish  young  beauty  and  her  tam 
bourine.  You  see,  I  didn't  want  it  a  long  show — just 
enough  to  make  the  two-bits  admission  seem  a  little 
short  of  robbery.  Our  real  graft,  of  course,  was  to  be 
where  the  young  society  debutantes  and  heiresses  in 
charge  of  the  booths  would  wheedle  money  out  of 
the  dazed  throng  for  chances  on  the  junk  that  would 
be  donated. 

Well,  about  three  days  before  the  show  I  went  up 
to  Masonic  Hall  to  see  about  the  stage  decorations, 
and  I  was  waiting  while  some  one  went  down  to  the 
Turf  Exchange  to  get  the  key  off  Tim  Mahoney,  the 
janitor — Tim  had  lately  had  to  do  janitor  work  for  a 
B'nai  B'rith  lodge  that  was  holding  meetings  there, 
and  it  had  made  him  gloomy  and  dissolute — and, 
while  I  was  waiting,  who  should  come  tripping  along 
but  Egbert  Floud,  all  sunned  up  like  a  man  that 
knows  the  world  is  his  oyster  and  every  month's  got 
an  "r"  in  it.  Usually  he's  a  kind  of  sad,  meek  coot, 
looking  neglected  and  put  upon;  but  now  he  was 


ALL  SUNNED  UP  LIKE  A  MAN  THAT  KNOWS  THE  WORLD  IS 
HIS  OYSTER  AND  EVERY  MONTH'S  GOT  AN  V  IN  IT" 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  235 

actually  giggling  to  himself  as  he  come  up  the  stairs 
two  at  a  time. 

"Well,  Old-Timer,  what  has  took  the  droop  out  of 
your  face?"  I  ask  him. 

"Why,"  he  says,  twinkling  all  over  the  place,  "I'm 
aiming  to  keep  it  a  secret,  but  I  don't  nu'nd  hinting  to 
an  old  friend  that  my  part  of  the  evening's  entertain 
ment  is  going  to  be  so  good  it'll  make  the  whole  show 
top-heavy.  Them  ladies  said  they'd  rely  on  me  to 
think  up  something  novel,  and  I  said  I  would  if  I 
could,  and  I  did — that's  all.  I'd  seen  enough  of 
these  shows  where  you  ladies  pike  along  with  pin 
cushions  and  fancy  lemonade  and  infants'  wear — and 
mebbe  a  red  plush  chair,  with  gold  legs,  that  plays 
*  Alice,  Where  Art  Thou?'  when  a  person  sets  down  on 
it — with  little  girls  speaking  a  few  pieces  about  the 
flowers  and  lambs,  and  so  on,  and  cleaning  up  about 
eleven-twenty-nine  on  the  evening's  revel — or  it 
would  be  that,  only  you  find  you  forgot  to  pay  the 
Golden  Rule  Cash  Store  for  the  red-and-blue  bunt 
ing,  and  they're  howling  for  their  money  like  a  wild 
cat.  Yes,  sir;  that's  been  the  way  of  it  with  woman 
at  the  helium.  I  wouldn't  wish  to  be  a  Belgian  at  all 
under  present  circumstances;  but  if  I  did  have  to  be 
one  I'd  hate  to  think  my  regular  meals  was  depending 
on  any  crooked  work  you  ladies  has  done  up  to 
date." 

"You'd  cheer  me  strangely,"  I  says,  "only  I  been  a 
diligent  reader  of  history,  and  somehow  I  can't  just 
recall  your  name  being  connected  up  with  any  cat- 


236  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

aclysms  of  finance.  I  don't  remember  you  ever  start 
ing  one  of  these  here  panics — or  stopping  one,  for 
that  matter.  I  did  hear  that  you'd  had  your  pocket 
picked  down  to  the  San  Francisco  Fan*.'* 

I  was  prodding  him  along,  understand,  so  he'd  flare 
up  and  tell  me  what  his  secret  enterprise  was  that 
would  make  women's  operations  look  silly  and  fem 
inine.  I  seen  his  eyes  kind  of  glisten  when  I  said  this 
about  him  being  touched. 

"That's  right,"  he  says.  "Some  lad  nicked  me  for 
my  roll  and  my  return  ticket,  and  my  gold  watch  and 
chain,  and  my  horseshoe  scarfpin  with  the  diamonds 
in  it." 

"You  stood  a  lot  of  pawing  over,"  I  says,  "for  a 
man  that's  the  keen  financial  genius  you  tell  about 
being.  This  lad  must  of  been  a  new  hand  at  it. 
Likely  he'd  took  lessons  from  a  correspondence 
school.  At  least,  with  you  standing  tied  and  blinded 
that  way,  a  good  professional  one  would  have  tried 
for  your  gold  tooth — or,  anyway,  your  collar  button. 
I  see  your  secret  though,"  I  go  on  as  sarcastically 
as  possible:  "You  got  the  lad's  address  and  you're 
going  to  have  him  here  Saturday  night  to  glide 
among  the  throng  and  ply  his  evil  trade.  Am  I  right 
or  wrong?" 

"You  are  not,"  he  says.  "I  never  thought  of  that. 
But  I  won't  say  you  ain't  warm  in  your  guess.  Yes, 
you  certainly  are  warm,  because  what  I'm  going  to 
do  is  just  as  dastardly,  without  being  so  darned  il 
legal,  except  to  an  extent." 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  237 

Well,  it  was  very  exasperating,  but  that  was  all  I 
could  get  out  of  him.  When  I  ask  for  details  he  just 
clams  up. 

"But,  mark  my  words,"  says  the  old  smarty,  "I'll 
show  you  it  takes  brains  in  addition  to  woman's  wiles 
and  artwork  to  make  a  decent  clean-up  in  this  little 
one-cylinder  town." 

"If  you  just  had  a  little  more  self-confidence,"  I 
says,  "you  might  of  gone  to  the  top;  lack  of  faith  in 
yourself  is  all  that's  kept  you  back.  Too  bad!" 

"All  right  for  you  to  kid  me,"  he  says;  "but  I'd  be 
almost  willing  to  give  you  two  dollars  for  every  dollar 
that  goes  out  of  this  hall  Saturday  night." 

Well,  it  was  kind  of  pathetic  and  disgusting  the  way 
this  poor  old  dub  was  leaning  on  his  certainty;  so  I  let 
him  alone  and  went  on  about  my  work,  thinking 
mebbe  he  really  had  framed  up  something  crooked 
that  would  bring  at  least  a  few  dollars  to  the 
cause. 

Every  time  I  met  him  for  the  next  three  days  after 
that  he'd  be  so  puffed  up,  like  a  toad,  with  importance 
and  low  remarks  about  woman  that,  at  last,  I  just 
ignored  him,  pretending  I  hadn't  the  least  curiosity 
about  his  evil  secret.  It  hurt  his  feelings  when  I  quit 
pestering  him  about  it,  but  he'd  been  outraging  mine 
right  along;  so  we  split  even. 

He'd  had  a  good-sized  room  just  down  the  hall 
turned  over  to  him,  and  a  lot  of  stuff  of  some  kind 
carried  in  there  in  the  night,  and  men  working,  with 
the  door  locked  all  the  time;  so  I  and  the  other  ladies 


238  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

went  calmly  on  about  our  own  business,  decorating 
the  main  hall  with  the  flags  of  all  nations,  fixing  up  the 
platform  and  the  booths  very  pretty,  and  giving  Mr. 
Smarty  Egbert  Floud  nothing  but  haughty  glances 
about  his  hidden  novelty.  Even  when  his  men  was 
hammering  away  in  there  at  their  work  he'd  have 
something  hung  over  the  keyhole — as  insulting  to  us 
as  only  a  man  can  be. 

Saturday  night  come  and  we  had  a  good  crowd. 
Cousin  Egbert  was  after  me  the  minute  I  got  my 
things  off  to  come  and  see  his  dastardly  secret;  but  I 
had  my  revenge.  I  told  him  I  had  no  curiosity  about 
it  and  was  going  to  be  awful  busy  with  my  show,  but 
I'd  try  as  a  personal  favour  to  give  him  a  look  over 
before  I  went  home.  Yes,  sir;  I  just  turned  him 
down  with  one  superior  look,  and  got  my  curtains 
slid  back  on  Mrs.  Leonard  Wales,  dressed  up  like  a 
superdreadnought  in  a  naval  parade  and  surrounded 
by  every  little  girl  in  town  that  had  a  white  dress. 
They  wasn't  states  this  time,  but  Columbia's 
Choicest  Heritage,  with  a  second  line  on  the  program 
saying,  "Future  Buds  and  Debutantes  From  So 
ciety's  Home  Galleries."  It  was  a  line  we  found 
under  some  babies'  photos  on  the  society  page  of  a 
great  newspaper  printed  in  New  York  City.  Profes 
sor  Gluckstein  and  his  son  Rudolph  played  the  "Star- 
Spangled  Banner"  on  the  piano  and  fiddle  during  this 
feature. 

Then  little  Magnesia  Waterman,  dressed  to  repre 
sent  the  Queen  of  Sheba,  come  forward  and  sung  the 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  239 

song  we'd  picked  out  for  her,  with  the  people  joining 
in  the  chorus: 

We're  for  you,  Woodrow  Wilson, 
One  Hundred  Million  Strong! 

We  put  you  in  the  White  House 
And  we  know  you  can't  do  wrong. 

It  was  very  successful,  barring  hisses  from  all  the 
Germans  and  English  present;  but  they  was  soon 
hushed  up.  Then  Doc  Sulloway  come  out  and  told 
some  funny  anecdotes  about  two  Irishmen  named  Pat 
and  Mike,  lately  landed  in  this  country  and  looking 
for  work,  and  imitated  two  cats  in  a  backyard,  and 
drawing  a  glass  of  soda  water,  and  sawing  a  plank  in 
two;  and  winding  up  with  the  announcement  that  he 
had  donated  a  dozen  bottles  of  the  great  Indian 
Snake  Oil  Remedy  for  man  and  beast  that  had  been 
imparted  to  him  in  secret  by  old  Rumpatunk,  the 
celebrated  medicine  man,  who  is  supposed  to  have 
had  it  from  the  Great  Spirit;  and  Ed  Bemis,  the 
World's  Challenge  Cornetist,  entertained  one  and  all; 
and  Beryl  Mae  done  her  Spanish  dance  that  I'd  last 
seen  her  give  at  the  Queen  Esther  Cantata  in  the  M. 
E.  Church.  And  that  was  the  end  of  the  show;  just 
enough  to  start  'em  buying  things  at  the  booths. 

At  least,  we  thought  it  would  be.  But  what  does  a 
lot  of  the  crowd  do,  after  looking  round  a  little,  but 
drift  out  into  the  hall  and  down  to  this  room  where 
Cousin  Egbert  had  his  foul  enterprise,  whatever  it 


240  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

was.  I  didn't  know  yet,  having  held  aloof,  as  you 
might  say,  owing  to  the  old  hound's  offensive  man 
ner.  But  I  had  heard  three  or  four  parties  kind  of 
gasping  to  each  other,  had  they  seen  what  that  Eg 
bert  Floud  was  doing  in  the  other  room? — with  looks 
of  horror  and  delight  on  their  faces.  That  made  me 
feel  more  superior  than  ever  to  the  old  smarty;  so  I 
didn't  go  near  the  place  yet,  but  herded  people  back 
to  the  raffles  wherever  I  could. 

The  first  thing  was  Lon  Price's  corner  lot,  for 
which  a  hundred  chances  had  been  sold.  Lon  had 
a  blueprint  showing  the  very  lot;  also  a  picture  of 
a  choice  dwelling  or  bungalow,  like  the  one  he  has 
painted  on  the  drop  curtain  of  Knapp's  Opera  House, 
under  the  line,  "Price's  Addition  to  Red  Gap;  Big 
Lots,  Little  Payments."  It's  a  very  fancy  house 
with  porches  and  bay  windows  and  towers  and  front 
steps,  and  everything,  painted  blue  and  green  and 
yellow;  and  a  blond  lady  in  a  purple  gown,  with  two 
golden-haired  tots  at  her  side,  is  waving  good-bye 
to  a  tall,  handsome  man  with  brown  whiskers  as  he 
hurries  out  to  the  waiting  street  car — though  the 
car  line  ain't  built  out  there  yet  by  any  means. 

However,  Lon  got  up  and  said  it  was  a  Paradise 
on  earth,  a  Heaven  of  Homes;  that  in  future  he  would 
sell  lots  there  to  any  native  Belgian  at  a  20  per  cent, 
discount;  and  he  hoped  the  lucky  winner  of  this 
lot  would  at  once  erect  a  handsome  and  commodious 
mansion  on  it,  such  as  the  artist  had  here  depicted; 
and  it  would  be  only  nine  blocks  from  the  swell  little 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  241 

Carnegie  Library  when  that,  also,  had  been  built,  the 
plans  for  it  now  being  in  his  office  safe. 

Quite  a  few  of  the  crowd  had  stayed  for  this,  and 
they  cheered  Lon  and  voted  that  little  Magnesia 
Waterman  was  honest  enough  to  draw  the  numbers 
out  of  a  hat.  They  was  then  drawn  and  read  by 
Lon  in  an  exciting  silence — except  for  Mrs.  Leonard 
Wales,  who  was  breathing  heavily  and  talking  to  her 
self  after  each  number.  She  and  Leonard  had  took  a 
chance  for  a  dollar  and  everybody  there  knew  it  by 
now.  She  was  dead  sure  they  would  get  the  lot. 
She  kept  telling  people  so,  right  and  left.  She  said 
they  was  .bound  to  get  it  if  the  drawing  was  honest. 
As  near  as  I  could  make  out,  she'd  been  taking  a 
course  of  lessons  from  a  professor  in  Chicago  about 
how  to  control  your  destiny  by  the  psychic  force 
that  dwells  within  you.  It  seems  all  you  got  to 
do  is  to  will  things  to  come  your  way  and  they  have 
to  come.  No  way  out  of  it.  You  step  on  this  here 
psychic  gas  and  get  what  you  ask  for. 

"I  already  see  our  little  home,"  says  Mrs.  Wales 
in  a  hoarse  whisper.  "I  see  it  objectively.  It  is 
mine.  I  claim  it  out  of  the  boundless  all-good.  I 
have  put  myself  in  the  correct  mental  attitude  of 
reception;  I  am  holding  to  the  perfect  All.  My  own 
will  come  to  me." 

And  so  on,  till  parties  round  her  begun  to  get  ner 
vous.  Yes,  sir;  she  kept  this  stuff  going  in  low,  tense 
tones  till  she  had  every  one  in  hearing  buffaloed; 
they  was  ready  to  give  her  the  lot  right  there  and 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

tear  up  their  own  tickets.  She  was  like  a  crapshooter 
when  he  keeps  calling  to  the  dice:  "Come,  seven — 
come  on,  come  on!"  All  right  for  the  psychics,  but 
that's  what  she  reminded  me  of. 

And  in  just  another  minute  everybody  there 
thought  she'd  cheated  by  taking  these  here  lessons 
that  she  got  from  Chicago  for  twelve  dollars;  for 
you  can  believe  it  or  not  but  her  number  won  the  lot. 
Yes,  sir;  thirty -three  took  the  deed  and  Lon  filled 
in  her  name  on  it  right  there.  Many  a  cold  look  was 
shot  at  her  as  she  rushed  over  to  embrace  her  hus 
band,  a  big  lump  of  a  man  that's  all  right  as  far  up 
as  his  Adam's  apple,  and  has  been  clerking  in  the  Owl 
Cigar  Store  ever  since  he  can  remember.  He  tells 
her  she  is  certainly  a  wonder  and  she  calls  him  a  silly 
boy;  says  it's  just  a  power  she  has  developed  through 
concentration,  and  now  she  must  claim  from  the  all- 
good  a  dear  little  home  of  seven  rooms  and  bath,  to 
be  built  on  this  lot;  and  she  knows  it  will  come  if  she 
goes  into  the  silence  and  demands  it.  Say!  People 
with  any  valuables  on  'em  begun  to  edge  off,  not 
knowing  just  how  this  strange  power  of  hers  might 
work. 

Then  I  look  round  and  see  the  other  booths  ain't 
creating  near  the  excitement  they  had  ought  to  be, 
only  a  few  here  and  there  taking  two-bit  chances  on 
things  if  Mrs.  Wales  ain't  going  in  on  'em,  too; 
several  of  the  most  attractive  booths  was  plumb 
deserted,  with  the  girls  in  charge  looking  mad  or 
chagrined,  as  you  might  say.  So  I  remember  this 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          243 

hidden  evil  of  Egbert  Floud's  and  that  the  crowd 
has  gone  there;  and  while  I'm  deciding  to  give  in  and 
gratify  my  morbid  curiosity,  here  comes  Cousin 
Egbert  himself,  romping  along  in  his  dinner-jacket 
suit  and  tan  shoes,  like  a  wild  mustang. 

"  What  was  I  telling  you? "  he  demands.  "Didn't 
I  tell  you  the  rest  of  this  show  was  going  to  die  stand 
ing  up?  Yes,  sir;  she's  going  to  pass  out  on  her 
feet."  And  he  waved  a  sneering  arm  round  at  the 
deserted  booths.  "What  does  parties  want  of  this 
truck  when  they  can  come  down  to  my  joint  and  get 
real  entertainment  for  their  money?  Why,  they're 
breaking  their  ankles  now  to  get  in  there ! " 

It  sure  looked  like  he  was  right  for  once  in  his 
life ;  so  I  says : 

"  What  is  it  you've  done?  " 

"Simple  enough,"  says  he,  " to  a  thinking  man.  It 
comes  to  me  like  a  flash  or  inspiration,  or  something, 
from  being  down  to  that  fair  in  San  Francisco,  Cali 
fornia.  Yes,  sir;  they  had  a  deadfall  there,  with 
every  kind  of  vice  rampant  that  has  ever  been  legal 
ized  any  place,  and  several  kinds  that  ain't  ever  been; 
they  done  everything,  from  strong-arm  work  to 
short  changing,  and  they  was  getting  by  with  it  by 
reason  of  calling  it  Ye  Olde  Tyme  Mining  Camp  of 
'49,  or  something  poetical  like  that.  That  was  where 
I  got  nicked  for  my  roll,  in  addition  to  about  fifty 
I  lost  at  a  crooked  wheel.  I  think  the  workers  was 
mostly  ex-convicts,  and  not  so  darned  ex-  at  that. 
Anyway,  their  stuff  got  too  raw  even  for  the  mana- 


244  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

gers  of  an  exposition,  so  they  had  to  close  down  in 
spite  of  their  name.  That's  where  I  get  my  idee 
when  these  ladies  said  think  up  something  novel 
and  pleasing.  Just  come  and  see  how  I'm  taking  it 
off  of  'em."  And,  with  that,  he  grabs  me  by  the 
arm  and  rushes  me  down  to  this  joint  of  his. 

At  the  side  of  the  doorway  he  had  two  signs  stuck 
up.  One  says,  Ye  Olde  Tyme  Saloone;  and  the  other 
says,  Ye  Olde  Tyme  Gambling  Denne.  You  could 
of  pushed  me  over  with  one  finger  when  I  looked  in. 
He'd  drew  the  crowd,  all  right.  I  knew  then  that 
Aggie  Tuttle  might  just  as  well  close  down  her 
Rebekkah-at-the-Well  dive,  and  that  no  one  was 
going  to  take  any  more  chances  on  pincushions  and 
tidies  and  knitted  bed  slippers. 

About  a  third  of  the  crowd  was  edged  up  to  the 
bar  and  keeping  Louis  Meyer  and  his  father  busy 
with  drink  orders,  and  the  other  two-thirds  was 
huddled  round  a  roulette  layout  across  the  room. 
They  was  Wedged  in  so  tight  I  couldn't  see  the  table, 
but  I  could  hear  the  little  ball  click  when  it  slowed  up, 
and  the  rattle  of  chips,  and  squeals  from  them  that 
won,  and  hoarse  mutters  from  the  losers. 

Cousin  Egbert  rubbed  his  hands  and  giggled,  wait 
ing  for  me  to  bedeck  him  with  floral  tributes. 

"I  suppose  you  got  a  crooked  wheel,"  I  says. 

"Shucks,  no!"  says  he.  "I  did  think  of  it,  but 
I'd  of  had  to  send  out  of  town  for  one  and  they're 
a  lot  of  trouble  to  put  in,  what  with  the  electric 
wiring  and  all;  and  besides,  the  straightest  roulette 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  245 

wheel  ever  made  is  crooked  enough  for  any  man  of 
decent  instincts.  I  don't  begrudge  'em  a  little  ex 
citement  for  their  money.  I  got  these  old  bar  fixings 
out  of  the  Spilmer  place  that  was  being  tore  down, 
and  we're  charging  two  bits  a  drink  for  whatever, 
and  that'll  be  a  help;  and  it  looks  to  me  like  you  ladies 
would  of  thought  you  needed  a  man's  brain  in  these 
shows  long  before  this.  Come  on  in  and  have  a  shot. 
I'll  buy." 

So  we  squeezed  in  and  had  one.  It  was  an  old- 
time  saloon,  all  right — that  is,  fairly  old;  about 
1889,  with  a  brass  foot  rail,  and  back  of  the  bar  a 
stuffed  eagle  and  a  cash  register.  A  gang  of  ladies 
was  taking  claret  lemonades  and  saying  how  delight 
fully  Bohemian  it  all  was;  and  Miss  Metta  Bigler, 
that  gives  lessons  in  oil  painting  and  burnt  wood, 
said  it  brought  back  very  forcibly  to  her  the  Latin 
Quarter  of  Chicago,  where  she  finished  her  art  course. 
Henrietta  Templeton  Price,  with  one  foot  on  the 
railing,  was  shaking  dice  with  three  other  prominent 
society  matrons  for  the  next  round,  and  saying  she 
had  always  been  a  Bohemian  at  heart,  only  you 
couldn't  go  very  far  in  a  small  town  like  this  with 
out  causing  unfavourable  comment  among  a  certain 
element. 

It  was  a  merry  scene,  with  the  cash  register  play 
ing  like  the  Swiss  Family  Bellringers.  Even  the  new 
Episcopalian  minister  come  along,  with  old  Proctor 
Kqapp,  and  read  the  signs  and  said  they  was  undeni 
ably  quaint,  and  took  a  slug  of  rye  and  said  it  was 


246  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

undeniably  delightful;  though  old  Proctor  roared  like 
a  maddened  bull  when  he  found  what  the  price  was. 
I  guess  you  can  be  an  Episcopalian  one  without  its 
interfering  much  with  man's  natural  habits  and  inno 
cent  recreations.  Then  he  went  over  and  lost  a 
two-bit  piece  on  the  double-o,  and  laughed  heartily 
over  the  occurrence,  saying  it  was  undeniably  piquant 
with  old  Proctor  plunging  ten  cents  on  the  red  and 
losing  it  quick,  and  saying  a  fool  and  his  money 
was  soon  parted — yes,  and  I  wish  I  had  as  much 
money  as  that  old  crook  ain't  foolish;  but  no  matter. 

Beryl  Mae  Macomber  was  aiding  the  Belgians  by 
running  out  in  the  big  room  to  drum  up  the  stragglers. 
She  was  now  being  Little  Nugget,  the  Miners'  Pet; 
and  when  she  wasn't  chasing  in  easy  money  she'd 
loll  at  one  end  of  the  bar  with  a  leer  on  her  flowerlike 
features  to  entice  honest  workingmen  in  to  lose  their 
all  at  the  gaming  tables.  There  was  chuck-a-luck 
and  a  crap  game  going,  and  going  every  minute,  too, 
with  Cousin  Egbert  trying  to  start  three-card  monte 
at  another  table — only  they  all  seemed  wise  to  that. 
Even  the  little  innocent  children  give  him  the 
laugh. 

I  went  over  to  the  roulette  table  and  lost  a  few 
dollars,  not  being  able  to  stick  long,  because  other 
women  would  keep  goring  me  with  their  elbows. 
Yes,  sir;  that  layout  was  ringed  with  women  four 
deep.  All  that  the  men  could  do  was  stand  on  the 
outside  and  pass  over  their  loose  silver  to  the  fair 
ones.  Sure!  Women  are  the  only  real  natural-born 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  247 

gamblers  in  the  world.  Take  a  man  that  seems  to  be 
one  and  it's  only  because  he's  got  a  big  streak  of 
woman  in  him,  even  if  it  don't  show  any  other  way. 
Men,  of  course,  will  gamble  for  the  fun  of  it;  but  it 
ain't  ever  funny  to  a  woman,  not  even  when  she  wins. 
It  brings  out  the  natural  wolf  in  her  like  nothing 
else  does.  It  was  being  proved  this  night  all  you'd 
want  to  see  anything  proved.  If  the  men  got  near 
enough  and  won  a  bet  they'd  think  it  was  a  good  joke 
and  stick  round  till  they  lost  it.  Not  so  my  own  sex. 
Every  last  one  of  'em  saw  herself  growing  rich  on 
Cousin  Egbert's  money — and  let  the  Belgians  look 
out  for  themselves. 

Mrs.  Tracy  Bangs,  for  instance,  fought  her  way 
out  of  the  mob,  looking  as  wild  as  any  person  in  a 
crazy  house,  choking  twenty-eight  dollars  to  death  in 
her  two  fists  that  she  win  off  two  bits.  She  crowds 
this  onto  Tracy  and  makes  him  swear  by  the  sacred 
memory  of  his  mother  that  he  will  positively  not  give 
her  back  a  cent  of  it  to  gamble  with  if  the  fever  comes 
on  her  again — not  even  if  she  begs  him  to  on  her 
bended  knees.  And  fifteen  minutes  later  the  poor 
little  shark  nearly  has  hysterics  because  Tracy  won't 
give  her  back  just  five  of  it  to  gamble  again  with. 
Sure !  A  very  feminine  woman  she  is. 

Tracy  is  a  pretty  good  little  sport  himself.  He 
says,  No,  and  that'll  be  all,  please,  not  only  on  ac 
count  of  the  sacred  memory  of  his  mother  but  because 
the  poor  Belgians  has  got  to  catch  it  going  if  they 
don't  catch  it  coming;  and  he's  beat  it  out  to  a  booth 


248          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

and  bought  the  twenty-five-dollar  gold  clock  with 
chimes,  with  the  other  three  dollars  going  for  the 
dozen  bottles  of  Snake  Oil  and  the  twenty  street-car 
tickets. 

And  now  let  there  be  no  further  words  about  it, 
but  there  was  when  she  hears  this  horrible  disclosure 
— lots  of  words,  and  the  brute  won't  even  give  her  the 
street-car  tickets,  which  she  could  play  in  for  a  dollar, 
and  she  has  to  go  to  the  retiring  room  to  bathe  her 
temples,  and  treats  Tracy  all  the  rest  of  the  evening 
like  a  crippled  stepchild,  thinking  of  all  she  could 
of  won  if  he  hadn't  acted  like  a  snake  in  the  grass 
to  ward  her! 

Right  after  this  Mrs.  Leonard  Wales,  in  her  flag 
and  powder,  begun  to  stick  up  out  of  the  scene, 
though  not  risking  any  money  as  yet.  She'd  just 
stand  there  like  one  petrified  while  cash  was  being 
paid  in  and  out,  keeping  away  about  three  women  of 
regular  size  that  would  like  to  get  their  silver  down. 
I  caught  the  gleam  in  her  eye,  and  the  way  she  drawed 
in  her  breath  when  the  lucky  number  was  called  out, 
kind  of  shrinking  her  upper  lip  every  time  in  a  blood 
thirsty  manner.  Yes,  sir;  in  the  presence  of  actual 
money  that  dame  reminded  me  of  the  great  saber- 
toothed  tiger  that  you  see  terrible  pictures  of  in  the 
animal  books. 

Pretty  soon  she  mowed  down  a  lot  of  her  sister 
gamblers  and  got  out  to  where  Leonard  was  standing, 
to  tell  him  all  about  how  she'd  have  won  a  lot  of 
money  if  she'd  only  put  some  chips  down  at  the  right 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  249 

time,  the  way  she  would  of  done  if  she'd  had  any; 
and  Leonard  said  what  a  shame!  And  they  drifted 
into  a  corner,  talking  low.  I  bet  she  was  asking 
him  if  she  couldn't  make  a  claim  to  these  here  bets 
she'd  won  in  her  mind,  and  if  this  wasn't  the  magic 
time  to  get  the  little  home  or  bungalow  on  the  new 
lot  she'd  won  by  finding  out  from  the  Chicago  profes 
sor  how  to  mould  her  destiny. 

Then  I  lose  track  of  the  two  for  a  minute,  because 
Judge  Ballard  comes  in  escorting  his  sister  from 
South  Carolina,  that's  visiting  them,  and  invites 
every  one  to  take  something  in  her  honour.  She  was 
a  frail  little  old  lady,  very  old-fashioned  indeed,  with 
white  hair  built  up  in  a  waterfall  and  curls  over  both 
ears,  and  a  flowered  silk  dress  that  I  bet  was  made  in 
Civil  War  times,  and  black  lace  mitts.  Say!  She 
looked  like  one  of  the  ladies  that  would  of  been  setting 
in  the  front  of  a  box  at  Ford's  Theatre  the  night 
President  Lincoln  was  shot  up! 

She  seemed  a  mite  rattled  when  she  found  herself 
in  a  common  barroom,  having  failed  to  read  Cousin 
Egbert's  undeniably  quaint  signs;  but  the  Judge 
introduced  her  to  some  that  hadn't  met  her  yet,  and 
when  he  asked  her  what  her  refreshment  would  be 
she  said  in  a  very  brazen  way  that  she  would  take  a 
drop  of  anisette  cordial.  Louis  Meyer  says  they 
ain't  keeping  that,  and  she  says,  Oh,  dear!  she's  too 
old-fashioned !  So  Cousin  Egbert  says,  why,  then  she 
should  take  an  old-fashioned  cocktail,  which  she  does 
and  sips  it  with  no  sign  of  relish.  Then  she  says  she 


250          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

will  help  the  cause  by  wagering  a  coin  on  yonder 
game  of  chance. 

The  Judge  paws  out  a  place  for  her  and  I  go  along 
to  watch.  She  pries  open  a  bead  reticule  that  my 
mother  had  one  like  and  gets  out  a  knitted  silk  purse, 
and  takes  a  five-dollar  gold  piece  into  her  little  bony 
white  fingers  and  drops  it  on  a  number,  and  says: 
"Now  that  is  well  over !"  But  it  wasn't  over.  There 
was  excitement  right  off,  because,  outside  of  some 
silver  dollars  I'd  lost  myself,  I  hadn't  seen  anything 
bigger  than  a  two-bit  piece  played  there  that  night. 
Right  over  my  shoulder  I  heard  heavy  breathing 
and  I  didn't  have  to  turn  round  to  know  it  was  Cora 
Wales.  W7hen  the  ball  slowed  up  she  quit  breathing 
entirely  till  it  settled. 

It  must  of  been  a  horrible  strain  on  her,  for  the 
man  was  raking  in  all  the  little  bets  and  leaving 
the  five-dollar  one  that  win.  Say!  That  woman 
gripped  an  arm  of  mine  till  I  thought  it  was  caught  in 
machinery  of  some  kind !  And  Mrs.  Doc  Martingale, 
that  she  gripped  on  the  other  side,  let  out  a  yell  of 
agony.  But  that  wasn't  the  worst  of  Cora  Wales' 
torture.  No,  sir !  She  had  to  stand  there  and  watch 
this  little  old-fashioned  sport  from  South  Carolina 
refuse  the  money! 

"But  I  can't  accept  it  from  you  good  people,"  says 
she  in  her  thin  little  voice.  "I  intended  to  help  the 
cause  of  those  poor  sufferers,  and  to  profit  by  the 
mere  inadvertence  of  your  toy  there  would  be  un 
speakable — really  no!" 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          251 

And  she  pushed  back  the  five  and  the  hundred  and 
seventy-five  that  the  dealer  had  counted  out  for  her, 
dusted  her  little  fingers  with  a  little  lace  handker 
chief  smelling  of  lavender,  and  asked  the  Judge  to 
show  her  a  game  that  wasn't  so  noisy. 

I  guess  Cora  Wales  was  lost  from  that  moment. 
She  had  Len  over  in  a  corner  again,  telling  him  how 
easy  it  was  to  win,  and  how  this  poor  demented  crea 
ture  had  left  all  hers  there  because  Judge  Ballard 
probably  didn't  want  to  create  a  scene  by  making  her 
take  it;  and  mustn't  they  have  a  lot  of  trouble  look 
ing  after  the  weak-minded  thing  all  the  time!  And 
I  could  hear  her  say  if  one  person  could  do  it  another 
could,  especially  if  they  had  learned  how  to  get  in 
tune  with  the  Infinite.  Len  says  all  right,  how 
much  does  she  want  to  risk?  And  that  scares  her 
plumb  stiff  again,  in  spite  of  her  uncanny  powers. 
She  says  it  wouldn't  be  right  to  risk  one  cent 
unless  she  could  be  sure  the  number  was  going  to 
win. 

Of  course  if  you  made  your  claim  on  the  Universal, 
your  own  was  bound  to  come  to  you;  still,  you  could 
n't  be  so  sure  as  you  ought  to  be  with  a  roulette 
wheel,  because  several  times  the  ball  had  gone  into 
numbers  that  she  wasn't  holding  for  with  her  psychic 
grip,  and  the  uncertainty  was  killing  her;  and  why 
didn't  he  say  something  to  help  her,  instead  of  stand 
ing  there  silent  and  letting  their  little  home  slip  from 
her  grasp? 

Cousin  Egbert  comes  up  just  then,  still  happy  and 


252  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

puffed  up;  so  I  put  him  wise  to  this  Wales  conspiracy 
against  his  game. 

"Mebbe  you  can  win  back  that  lot  from  her," 
I  says,  "and  raffle  it  over  again  for  the  fund.  She's 
getting  worked  up  to  where  she'll  take  a  chance." 

"Good  work!"  says  he.  "I'll  approach  her  in  the 
matter." 

So  over  he  goes  and  tries  to  interest  her  in  the  dice 
games;  but  no,  she  thinks  dice  is  low  and  a  mere 
coloured  person's  game.  So  then  he  says  to  set  down 
to  the  card  table  and  play  this  here  Canfield  solitaire; 
she's  to  be  paid  five  dollars  for  every  card  she  gets  up 
and  a  whole  thousand  if  she  gets  'em  all  up.  That 
listens  good  to  her  till  she  finds  she  has  to  give 
fifty-two  dollars  for  the  deck  first.  She  says  she 
knew  there  must  be  some  catch  about  it.  Still,  she 
tries  out  a  couple  of  deals  just  to  see  what  would 
happen,  and  on  the  first  she  would  have  won  thirteen 
dollars  and  on  the  second  eight  dollars.  She  figures 
then  that  by  all  moral  rights  Cousin  Egbert  owes  her 
twenty-one  dollars,  and  at  least  eight  dollars  to  a 
certainty,  because  she  was  really  playing  for  money 
the  second  time  and  merely  forgot  to  mention  it  to 
him. 

And  while  they  sort  of  squabble  about  this,  with 
Cousin  Egbert  very  pig-headed  or  adamant,  who 
should  come  in  but  this  Sandy  Sawtelle,  that's  now 
sobbing  out  his  heart  in  song  down  there;  and  with 
him  is  Buck  Devine.  It  seems  they  been  looking 
for  a  game,  and  they  give  squeals  of  joy  when  they 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  253 

see  this  one.  In  just  two  minutes  Sandy  is  collecting 
thirty-five  dollars  for  one  that  he  had  carefully  placed 
on  No.  11.  He  gives  a  glad  shout  at  this,  and  Leon 
ard  Wales  and  lady  move  over  to  see  what  it's  all 
about.  Sandy  is  neatly  stacking  his  red  chips  and 
plays  No.  11  once  more,  but  No.  22  comes  up. 

"Gee!"  says  Sandy.  "I  forgot.  Twenty-two,  of 
course,  and  likewise  33." 

So  he  now  puts  dollar  bets  on  all  three  numbers, 
and  after  a  couple  more  turns  he's  collecting  on 
33,  and  the  next  time  22  comes  again.  He  don't 
hardly  have  time  to  stack  his  chips,  they  come  so  fast; 
and  then  it's  No.  11  once  more,  amid  rising  excitement 
from  all  present.  Cora  Wrales  is  panting  like  the  Dy 
ing  Gamekeeper  I  once  saw  in  the  Eden  Musee  in  New 
York  City.  Sandy  quits  now  for  a  moment. 

"Let  every  man,  woman,  and  child,  come  one,  come 
all,  acrost  the  room  and  crook  the  convivial  elbow  on 
my  ill-gotten  gains!"  he  calls  out. 

So  everybody  orders  something,  Tim  Mahoney 
going  in  behind  the  bar  to  help  out.  Even  Cora 
Wales  come  over  when  she  understood  no  expense 
was  attached  to  so  doing,  though  taking  a  plain 
lemonade,  because  she  said  alcohol  would  get 
one's  vibrations  all  fussed  up,  or  something  like 
that. 

Cousin  Egbert  was  still  chipper  after  this  reverse, 
though  it  had  swept  away  about  all  he  was  to  the 
good  up  to  that  time. 

"Three  rousing  cheers!"  says  he.     "And  remember 


254  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

the  little  ball  still  rolls  for  any  sport  that  thinks  he 
can  Dutch  up  the  game!" 

While  this  drink  is  going  on  amid  the  general  glad 
feeling  that  always  prevails  when  some  spendthrift 
has  ordered  for  the  house,  Leonard  Wales  gets  Buck 
Devine  to  one  side  and  says  how  did  Sandy  do  it? 
So  Buck  tells  him  and  Cora  that  Sandy  took  eleven 
stitches  in  Jerry's  hide  yesterday  afternoon  and  he 
was  playing  this  hunch,  which  he  had  reason  to  feel 
was  a  first-class  one. 

"If  I  could  only  feel  it  was  a  cosmic  certainty " 

says  Cora. 

"Oh,  she's  cosmic,  all  right!"  says  Buck.  "I 
never  seen  anything  cosmicker.  Look  what  she's 
done  already,  and  Sandy  only  begun!  Just  watch 
him!  He'll  cosmic  this  here  game  to  a  standstill. 
He'll  have  Sour  Dough  there  touching  him  for  two-bits 
breakfast  money — see  if  he  don't." 

"But  eleven  came  only  twice,"  says  the  conserva 
tive  Cora. 

"Sure!  But  did  you  notice  Nos.  22  and  33?"  says 
Buck.  "You  got  to  humour  any  good  hunch  to  a 
certain  extent,  cosmic  or  no  cosmic." 

"I  see,"  says  Cora  with  gleaming  eyes;  "and  No. 
33  is  not  only  what  drew  our  beautiful  building  lot 
but  it  is  also  the  precise  number  of  my  years  on  the 
earth  plane." 

Cousin  Egbert  overheard  this  and  snorted  like  no 
gentleman  had  ought  to,  even  in  the  lowest  gambling 
den. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          255 

"Thirty-three !"  says  he  to  me.  "Did  you  hear  the 
big  cheat?  Say!  No  gambling  house  on  earth 
would  have  the  nerve  to  put  her  right  age  on  a  wheel ! 
The  chances  is  ruinous  enough  now  without  running 
'em  up  to  forty-eight  or  so.  I  bet  that's  about  what 
you'd  find  if  you  was  to  tooth  her." 

Sandy  has  now  gone  back,  followed  by  the  crowd, 
and  wins  another  bet  on  No.  11.  This  is  too  much 
for  Cora's  Standard  Oil  instincts.  She  never  trusts 
Leonard  with  any  money,  but  she  goes  over  into  a 
corner,  hikes  the  flag  of  her  country  up  over  one  red 
stocking  for  a  minute,  and  comes  back  with  a  two- 
dollar  bill,  which  she  splits  on  22  and  33;  and  when 
33  wins  she's  mad  clean  through  because  22  didn't 
also  win,  and  she's  wasted  a  whole  dollar,  like  throw 
ing  it  into  the  Atlantic  Ocean. 

"Too  bad,  Pettie!"  says  Leonard,  who  was  crowded 
in  by  her.  "But  you  mustn't  expect  to  have  all  the 
luck" — which  is  about  the  height  of  Leonard's  mental 
reach. 

"It  was  not  luck;  it  was  simple  lack  of  faith,"  says 
Cora.  "I  put  myself  in  tune  with  the  Infinite  and 
make  my  claim  upon  the  all-good — and  then  I  waver. 
The  loss  of  that  dollar  was  a  punishment  to  me." 

Now  she  stakes  a  dollar  on  No.  33  alone,  and  when 
it  comes  double-o  she  cries  out  that  the  man  had 
leaned  his  hand  on  the  edge  of  the  table  while  the  ball 
was  rolling  and  thereby  mushed  up  her  cosmic  vibra 
tions,  even  if  he  didn't  do  something  a  good  deal  more 
crooked.  Then  she  switches  to  No.  22,  and  that  wins. 


256  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

She  now  gets  suspicious  of  the  chips  and  has  'em 
turned  into  real  money,  which  she  stuffs  into  her 
consort's  pockets  for  the  time  being,  all  but  two  dol 
lars  that  go  on  Nos.  11  and  33.  And  No.  22  comes 
up  again.  She  nearly  fainted  and  didn't  recover  in 
time  to  get  anything  down  for  the  next  roll — and  I'm 
darned  if  11  don't  show!  She  turns  savagely  on  her 
husband  at  this.  The  poor  hulk  only  says: 

"But,  Pettie,  you're  playing  the  game — I  ain't." 

She  replies  bitterly : 

"Oh,  ain't  that  just  like  a  man!  I  knew  you  were 
going  to  say  that!" — and  seemed  to  think  she  had 
him  well  licked. 

Then  the  single-o  come.     She  says: 

"Oh,  dear!  It  seems  that,  even  with  the  higher 
consciousness,  one  can't  be  always  certain  of  one's 
numbers  at  this  dreadful  game." 

And  while  she  was  further  reproaching  her  husband, 
taking  time  to  do  it  good  and  keeping  one  very  damp 
dollar  safe  in  her  hand,  what  comes  up  but  old  33 
again ! 

It  looked  like  hysterics  then,  especially  when  she 
noticed  Buck  Devine  helping  pile  Sandy's  chips  up  in 
front  of  him  till  they  looked  like  a  great  old  English 
castle,  with  towers  and  minarets,  and  so  on,  Sandy 
having  played  his  hunch  strong  and  steady.  She 
waited  for  another  turn  that  come  nothing  important 
to  any  of  'em;  then  she  drew  Leonard  out  and  made 
him  take  her  for  a  glass  of  lemonade  out  where  Aggie 
Tuttle  was  being  Rebekkah  at  the  Well,  because  they 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  257 

charged  two  bits  for  it  at  the  bar  and  Aggie's  was  only 
a  dime.  The  sale  made  forty  cents  Aggie  had  took 
in  on  the  evening. 

Racing  back  to  Ye  Olde  Tyme  Gambling  Denne, 
she  gets  another  hard  blow;  for  Sandy  has  not  only 
win  another  of  his  magic  numbers  but  has  bought  up 
the  bar  for  the  evening,  inviting  all  hands  to  brim  a 
cup  at  his  expense,  whenever  they  crave  it — nobody's 
money  good  but  his;  so  Cora  is  not  only  out  what  she 
would  of  made  by  following  his  play  but  the  ten 
cents  cash  she  has  paid  Aggie  Tuttle.  She  was  not  a 
woman  to  be  trifled  with  then.  She  took  another 
lemonade  because  it  was  free,  and  made  Len  take 
one  that  he  didn't  want.  Then  she  draws  three  dol 
lars  from  him  and  covers  the  three  numbers  with 
reckless  and  noble  sweeps  of  her  powerful  arms.  The 
game  was  on  again. 

Cousin  Egbert  by  now  was  looking  slightly  dis 
turbed,  or  outrS,  as  the  French  put  it,  but  tries  to 
conceal  same  under  an  air  of  sparkling  gayety,  laugh 
ing  freely  at  every  little  thing  in  a  girlish  or  painful 
manner. 

"Yes,"  says  he  coquettishly;  "that  Sandy  scoun 
drel  is  taking  it  fast  out  of  one  pocket,  but  he's 
putting  it  right  back  into  the  other.  The  wheel's 
loss  is  the  bar's  gain." 

I  looked  over  to  size  Sandy's  chips  and  I  could  see 
four  or  five  markers  that  go  a  hundred  apiece. 

"I  admire  your  roguish  manner  that  don't  fool 
any  one,"  I  says;  "but  if  we  was  to  drink  the  half  of 


258          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Sandy's  winnings,  even  at  your  robber  prices,  we'd  all 
be  submerged  to  the  periscope.  It  looks  to  me,"  I 
goes  on,  "like  the  bazaar-robbing  genius  is  not  ex 
clusively  a  male  attribute  or  tendency." 

"How  many  of  them  knitted  crawdabs  you  sold 
out  there  at  your  booths?"  he  demands.  "Not 
enough  to  buy  a  single  Belgian  a  T-bone  steak  and 
fried  potatoes." 

"Is  that  so,  indeed?"  I  says.  "Excuse  me  a  min 
ute.  Standing  here  in  the  blinding  light  of  your 
triumph,  I  forgot  a  little  matter  of  detail  such  as  our 
sex  is  always  wasting  its  energies  on." 

So  I  call  Sandy  and  Buck  away  from  their  Belgian 
atrocities  and  speak  sharply  to  'em. 

"You  boys  ought  to  be  ashamed  of  yourselves," 
I  says — "winning  all  that  money  and  then  acting 
like  old  Gaspard  the  Miser  in  the  Chimes  of  Nor 
mandy!  Can't  you  forget  your  natural  avarice  and 
loosen  up  some?" 

"I  bought  the  bar,  didn't  I?"  asks  Sandy.  "I 
can't  do  no  more,  can  I?" 

"You  can,"  I  says.  "Out  in  that  big  room  is  about 
eighteen  tired  maids  and  matrons  of  Red  Gap's  most 
exclusive  inner  circles  yawning  their  heads  off  over 
goods,  wares,  and  merchandise  that  no  one  will  look 
at  while  this  sinful  game  is  running.  If  you  got  a 
spark  of  manhood  in  you  go  on  out  and  trade  a  little 
with  'em,  just  to  take  the  curse  off  your  depredations 
in  here." 

"Why,  sure!"  says  Sandy.     He  goes  back  to  the 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  259 

layout  and  loads  Buck's  hat  full  of  red  and  blue 
chips  at  one  and  two  dollars  each.  "Go  buy  the 
place  clean,"  he  says  to  Buck.  "Do  it  good;  don't 
leave  a  single  object  of  use  or  luxury.  My  instruc 
tions  is  sweeping,  understand.  And  if  there's  a  har 
ness  booth  there  you  order  a  solid  gold  collar  for  old 
Jerry,  heavily  incrusted  with  jewels  and  his  initials 
and  mine  surrounded  by  a  wreath.  Also,  send  out  a 
pint  of  wine  for  every  one  of  these  here  maids  and 
matrons.  Meantime,  I  shall  stick  here  and  keep  an 
eye  on  my  large  financial  interests." 

So  Buck  romps  off  on  his  joyous  mission,  singing  a 
little  ballad  that  goes:  "To  hell  with  the  man  that 
works!"  And  Sandy  moves  quickly  back  to  the 
wheel. 

I  followed  and  found  Cora  barely  surviving  be 
cause  she's  lost  nine  of  her  three-dollar  bets  while 
Sandy  was  away,  leaving  her  only  about  a  hundred 
winner.  Len  was  telling  her  to  "be  brave,  Pettie!" 
and  she  was  saying  it  was  entirely  his  fault  that  they 
hadn't  already  got  their  neat  little  home;  but  she 
would  have  it  before  she  left  the  place  or  know  the 
reason  why. 

It  just  did  seem  as  if  them  three  numbers  had  been 
resting  while  Sandy  was  away  talking  to  me.  They 
begin  to  show  up  again  the  minute  he  resumed  his 
bets,  and  Cora  was  crowding  onto  the  same  with  a 
rising  temperature.  Yes,  sir,  it  seemed  downright 
uncanny  or  miraculous  the  way  one  or  the  other  of 
'em  showed  up,  with  Sandy  saying  it  was  a  shame  to 


260          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

take  the  money,  and  Cora  saying  it  was  a  shame  she 
had  to  bet  on  all  three  numbers  and  get  paid  only  on 
one. 

Of  course  others  was  also  crowding  these  numbers, 
though  not  so  many  as  you'd  think,  because  every  one 
said  the  run  must  be  at  an  end,  and  they'd  be  a  fool 
to  play  'em  any  farther;  and  them  that  did  play  'em 
was  mostly  making  ten-cent  bets  to  be  on  the  safe 
side.  Only  Sandy  and  Cora  kept  right  on  showing  up 
one  Egbert  Floud  as  a  party  that  had  much  to  learn 
about  pulling  off  a  good  bazaar. 

It's  a  sad  tale.  Cousin  Egbert  had  to  send  out 
twice  for  more  cash,  Cora  Wales  refusing  to  take  his 
check  on  the  Farmers  and  Merchants  National  for 
hers.  She  said  she  was  afraid  there  would  be  some 
catch  about  it.  I  met  Egbert  out  in  the  hall  after  the 
second  time  she'd  made  him  send  and  he'd  lost  much 
of  his  sparkle. 

"I  never  thought  it  was  right  to  strike  a  lady  with 
out  cause,"  he  says  bitterly;  "but  I'd  certainly  hate  to 
trust  myself  with  that  frail  out  in  some  lonely  spot, 
like  Price's  Addition,  where  her  screams  couldn't  be 
heard." 

"That's  right,"  I  says;  "take  it  out  on  the  poor 
woman  that's  trying  to  win  a  nice  bungalow  with  big 
sawed  corners  sticking  out  all  over  it,  when  that  cut 
throat  Sandy  Sawtelle  has  win  about  twice  as  much ! 
That  ain't  the  light  of  pure  reason  I  had  the  right  to 
expect  from  the  Bazaar  King  of  Red  Gap." 

"That's  neither  here  nor  there,"  says  he  with  pet- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  261 

ulance.  "Sandy  would  of  been  just  as  happy  if  he'd 
lost  the  whole  eighteen  dollars  him  and  Buck  come  in 
here  with." 

"Well,"  I  warns  him,  "it  looks  to  me  like  you'd 
have  to  apply  them  other  drastic  methods  you  met 
with  in  this  deadfall  at  the  San  Francisco  Fair — 
strong-arm  work  or  medicine  in  the  drinks  of  the 
winners,  or  something  like  that — if  you  want  to  keep 
a  mortgage  off  the  old  home.  Of  course  I  won't 
crowd  you  for  that  two  dollars  you  promised  me  for 
every  one  that  goes  out  of  the  hall.  You  can  have 
any  reasonable  time  you  want  to  pay  that,"  I 
says. 

"  That's  neither  here  nor  there,"  he  says.  "  Luck's 
got  to  turn.  The  wheel  ain't  ever  been  made  that 
could  stand  that  strain  much  longer." 

And  here  Luella  Stultz  comes  up  and  says  Mrs. 
Wales  wants  to  know  how  much  she  could  bet  all  at 
once  if  she  happened  to  want  to.  I  could  just  see 
Cora  having  a  sharp  pain  in  the  heart  like  a  knife 
thrust  when  she  thought  what  she  would  of  win  by 
betting  ten  dollars  instead  of  one.  Cousin  Egbert 
answers  Luella  quite  viciously. 

"Tell  that  dame  the  ceiling  sets  the  limit  now," 
says  he;  "but  if  that  ain't  lofty  enough  I'll  have  a  sky 
light  sawed  into  it  for  her." 

Then  he  goes  over  to  watch,  himself,  being  all 
ruined  up  by  these  plungers.  Leonard  was  saying: 
"  Now  don't  be  rash,  Pettie ! "  And  Pettie  was  telling 
him  it  was  his  negative  mind  that  had  kept  her  from 


262  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

betting  five  dollars  every  clip,  and  look  what  that 
would  mean  to  their  pile! 

Cousin  Egbert  give  'em  one  look  and  says,  right  out 
loud,  Leonard  Wales  is  the  biggest  ham  that  was  ever 
smoked,  and  he'd  like  to  meet  him,  man  to  man,  out 
side;  then  he  goes  off  muttering  that  he  can  be 
pushed  so  far,  but  in  the  excitement  of  the  play  no 
one  pays  the  least  attention  to  him.  A  little  later  I 
see  him  all  alone  out  in  the  hall  again.  He  was 
scrunched  painfully  up  in  a  chair  till  he  looked  just 
like  this  here  French  metal  statue  called  Lee  Penser, 
which  in  our  language  means  "The  Thinker."  I  let 
him  think,  not  having  the  heart  to  prong  him  again  so 
quick. 

And  the  game  goes  merrily  on,  with  Sandy  collect 
ing  steadily  on  his  hunch  and  Cora  Wales  telling  her 
husband  the  truth  about  himself  every  time  one  of 
these  three  numbers  didn't  win;  she  exposed  some 
very  distressing  facts  about  his  nature  the  time  she 
put  five  apiece  on  the  three  numbers  and  the  single-o 
come  up.  It  was  a  mad  life,  that  last  hour,  with  a 
lot  of  other  enraged  ladies  round  the  layout,  some 
being  mad  because  they  hadn't  had  money  to  play 
the  hunch  with,  and  others  because  they  hadn't  had 
the  nerve. 

Then  somebody  found  it  was  near  midnight  and 
the  crowd  begun  to  fall  away.  Cousin  Egbert  strolls 
by  and  says  don't  quit  on  his  account — that  they  can 
stick  there  and  play  their  hunch  till  the  bad  place 
freezes  over,  for  all  he  cares;  and  he  goes  over  to  the 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  263 

bar  and  takes  a  drink  all  by  himself,  which  in  him  is  a 
sign  of  great  mental  disturbance. 

Then,  for  about  twenty  minutes,  I  was  chatting 
with  the  Mes-dames  Ballard  and  Price  about  what  a 
grand  success  our  part  had  been,  owing  to  Sandy  act 
ing  the  fool  with  Cousin  Egbert's  money,  which  the 
latter  ain't  wise  to  yet.  When  I  next  notice  the  game 
a  halt  has  been  called  by  Cora  Wales.  It  seems  the 
hunch  has  quit  working.  Neither  of  'em  has  won  a 
bet  for  twenty  minutes  and  Cora  is  calling  the  game 
crooked. 

"It  looks  very,  very  queer,"  says  she,  "that  our 
numbers  should  so  suddenly  stop  winning;  very  queer 
and  suspicious  indeed!"  And  she  glared  at  Cousin 
Egbert  with  rage  and  distrust  splitting  fifty-fifty  in 
her  fevered  eyes. 

Cousin  Egbert  replied  quickly,  but  he  kind  of 
sputtered  and  so  couldn't  have  been  arrested  for 
it. 

"Oh,  I've  no  doubt  you  can  explain  it  very  glibly," 
says  Cora;  "but  it  seems  very  queer  indeed  to  Leon 
ard  and  I,  especially  coming  at  this  peculiar  time, 
when  our  little  home  is  almost  within  my  grasp." 

Cousin  Egbert  just  walked  off,  though  opening  and 
shutting  his  hands  in  a  nervous  way,  like,  in  fancy 
free,  he  had  her  out  on  her  own  lot  in  Price's  Addition 
and  was  there  abusing  her  fatally. 

"Very  well!"  says  Cora  with  great  majesty.  "He 
may  evade  giving  me  a  satisfactory  explanation  of 
this  extraordinary  change,  but  I  shall  certainly  not 


264  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

remain  in  this  place  and  permit  myself  to  be  fleeced. 
Here,  darling!" 

And  she  stuffs  some  loose  silver  into  darling's  last 
pocket  that  will  hold  any  more.  He  was  already 
wadded  with  bills  and  sagging  with  coin,  till  it  didn't 
look  like  the  same  suit  of  clothes.  Then  she  stood 
there  with  a  cynical  smile  and  watched  Sandy  still 
playing  his  hunch,  ten  dollars  to  a  number,  and  never 
winning  a  bet. 

"You  poor  dupe!"  says  she  when  Sandy  himself 
finally  got  tired  and  quit.  "  It's  especially  awkward," 
she  adds,  "because  while  we  have  saved  enough  to 
start  our  little  nook,  it  will  have  to  be  far  less  pre 
tentious  than  I  was  planning  to  make  it  while  the 
game  seemed  to  be  played  honestly." 

Cousin  Egbert  gets  this  and  says,  as  polite  as  a 
stinging  lizard,  that  he  stands  ready  to  give  her  a 
chance  at  any  game  she  can  think  of,  from  mumblety- 
peg  up.  He  says  if  she'll  turn  him  and  Leonard  loose 
in  a  cellar  that  he'll  give  her  fifty  dollars  for  every  one 
she's  winner  if  he  don't  have  Len  screaming  for  help 
inside  of  one  minute — or  make  it  fifteen  seconds. 
Len,  who's  about  the  size  of  a  freight  car,  smiles  kind 
of  sickish  at  this,  and  says  he  hopes  there's  no  hard 
feelings  among  old  friends  and  lodge  brothers;  and 
Egbert  says,  Oh,  no !  It  would  just  be  in  the  nature 
of  a  friendly  contest,  which  he  feels  very  much  like 
having  one,  since  he  can  be  pushed  just  so  far;  but 
Cora  says  gambling  has  brutalized  him. 

Then  she  sees  the  cards  on  the  table  and  asks  again 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  265 

about  this  game  where  you  play  cards  with  yourself 
and  mebbe  win  a  thousand  dollars  cold.  She  wants 
to  know  if  you  actually  get  the  thousand  in  cash,  and 
Egbert  says: 

" Sure!  A  thousand  that  any  bank  in  town  would 
accept  at  par." 

She  picks  up  the  deck  and  almost  falls,  but  thinks 
better  of  it. 

"Could  I  play  with  my  own  cards?"  she  wants  to 
know,  looking  suspicious  at  these.  Egbert  says  she 
sure  can.  "And  in  my  own  home?"  asks  Cora. 

"Your  own  house  or  any  place  else,"  says  Egbert, 
"  and  any  hour  of  the  day  or  night.  Just  call  me  up 
when  you  feel  lucky." 

"We  could  embellish  our  little  nook  with  many 
needful  things,"  says  Cora.  "A  thousand  dollars 
spent  sensibly  would  do  marvels."  But  after  fiddling 
a  bit  more  with  the  cards  she  laid  'em  down  with  a 
pitiful  sigh. 

Cousin  Egbert  just  looked  at  her,  then  looked 
away  quick,  as  if  he  couldn't  stand  it  any  more,  and 
says:  "War  is  certainly  what  that  man  Sherman  said 
it  was." 

Then  he  watches  Sandy  Sawtelle  cashing  in  his 
chips  and  is  kind  of  figuring  up  his  total  losses;  so  I 
can't  resist  handing  him  another. 

"I  don't  know  what  us  Mes-dames  would  of  done 
without  your  master  mind,"  I  says;  "and  yet  I'd 
hate  to  be  a  Belgian  with  the  tobacco  habit  and  have 
to  depend  on  you  to  gratify  it." 


266  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"Well,"  lie  answers,  very  mad,  "I  don't  see  so 
many  of  'em  getting  tobacco  heart  with  the  proceeds 
of  your  fancy  truck  out  in  them  booths  either!" 

"Don't  you  indeed?"  I  says,  and  just  at  the  right 
moment,  too.  "  Then  you  better  take  another  look  or 
get  your  eyes  fixed  or  something." 

For  just  then  Sandy  stands  up  on  a  chair  and  says : 

"Ladies  and  gents,  a  big  pile  of  valuable  presents  is 
piled  just  at  the  right  of  the  main  entrance  as  you  go 
out,  and  I  hope  you  will  one  and  all  accept  same  with 
the  welcome  compliments  of  me  and  old  Jerry,  that  I 
had  to  take  eleven  stitches  in  the  hide  of.  As  you 
will  pass  out  in  an  orderly  manner,  let  every  lady  help 
herself  to  two  objects  that  attract  her,  and  every  gent 
help  himself  to  one  object;  and  no  crowding  or  pulling 
I  trust,  because  some  of  the  objects  would  break,  like 
the  moustache  cup  and  saucer,  or  the  drainpipe,  with 
painted  posies  on  it,  to  hold  your  umbrels.  Remem 
ber  my  words — every  lady  two  objects  and  every 
gent  one  only.  There  is  also  a  new  washboiler  full  of 
lemonade  that  you  can  partake  of  at  will,  though  I 
guess  you  won't  want  any — and  thanking  you  one 
and  all!" 

So  they  cheer  Sandy  like  mad  and  beat  it  out  to  get 
first  grab  at  the  plunder;  and  just  as  Cousin  Egbert 
thinks  he  now  knows  the  worst,  in  comes  the  girls  that 
had  the  booths,  bringing  all  the  chips  Buck  Devine 
had  paid  'em — two  hundred  and  seventy-eight  dol 
lars'  worth  that  Egbert  has  to  dig  down  for  after  he 
thinks  all  is  over. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  267 

"Ain't  it  jolly,"  I  says  to  him  while  he  was  writing 
another  check  on  the  end  of  the  bar.  "This  is  the 
first  time  us  ladies  ever  did  clean  out  every  last  object 
at  a  bazaar.  Not  a  thing  left;  and  I  wish  we'd  got  in 
twice  as  much,  because  Sandy  don't  do  things  by 
halves  when  his  money  comes  easy  from  some  poor 
dub  that  has  thought  highly  of  himself  as  a  thinker 
about  money  matters."  He  pretends  not  to  hear  me 
because  of  signing  his  name  very  carefully  to  the 
check.  "And  what  a  sweet  little  home  you'll  build 
for  the  Wales  family!"  I  says.  "I  can  see  it  now,  all 
ornamented  up,  and  with  one  of  these  fancy  bunga 
low  names  up  over  the  front  gate — probably  they'll 
call  it  The  Breakers!" 

But  he  wouldn't  come  back;  so  I  left  him  sur 
rounded  by  the  wreck  of  his  former  smartiness  and 
went  home.  At  the  door  where  the  treasures  had 
been  massed  not  a  solitary  thing  was  left  but  a 
plush  holder  for  a  whisk  broom,  with  hand-painted 
pansies  on  the  front;  and  I  decided  I  could  live 
without  that.  Tim  Mahoney  was  there,  grouch 
ing  round  about  having  to  light  up  the  hall  next 
night  for  the  B'nai  B'rith;  and  I  told  him  to  take 
it  for  himself.  He  already  had  six  drawn  work 
doilies  and  a  vanity  box  with  white  and  red  powder 
in  it. 

As  I  go  by  the  Hong  Kong  Quick  Lunch,  Sandy 
and  three  or  four  others  is  up  on  stools;  the  China 
man,  cooking  things  behind  the  counter,  is  wearing  a 
lavender-striped  silk  dressing  sacque  and  a  lace 


268          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

boudoir  cap  with  pink  ribbons  in  it.  Yes;  we'd  all 
had  a  purple  night  of  it! 

Next  day  about  noon  I'm  downtown  and  catch 
sight  of  Cousin  Egbert  setting  in  the  United  States 
Grill  having  breakfast;  so  I  feel  mean  enough  to  go 
in  and  gloat  over  him  some  more.  I  think  to  find 
him  all  madded  up  and  mortified;  but  he's  strangely 
cheerful  for  one  who  has  suffered.  He  was  bearing 
up  so  wonderful  that  I  asked  why. 

"Ain't,  you  heard?"  says  he,  blotting  round  in  his 
steak  platter  with  a  slice  of  bread.  "Well,  I  got 
even  with  that  Wales  outfit  just  before  daylight — 
that's  all!" 

"Talk  on,"  I  beg,  quite  incredulous. 

"I  didn't  get  to  bed  till  about  two,"  he  says, 
"and  at  three  I  was  woke  up  by  the  telephone.  It's 
this  big  stiff  Len  Wales,  that  had  ought  to  have  his 
head  taken  off  because  it  only  absorbs  nourishment 
from  his  system  and  gives  nothing  in  return.  He's 
laughing  in  a  childish  frenzy  and  says  is  this  me?  I 
says  it  is,  but  that's  neither  here  nor  there,  and  what 
does  he  want  at  this  hour?  'It's  a  good  joke  on  you,' 
he  says,  'for  the  little  woman  got  it  on  the  third  trial.' 
'Got  what?'  I  wanted  to  know.  'Got  that  soli 
taire,'  he  yells.  'And  it's  a  good  joke  on  you,  all 
right,  because  now  you  owe  her  the  thousand  dollars; 
and  I  hate  to  bother  you,  but  you  know  how  some 
women  are  that  have  a  delicate,  high-strung  organiza 
tion.  She  says  she  won't  be  able  to  sleep  a  wink  if 
you  don't  bring  it  up  to  her  so  she  can  have  all  our 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  269 

little  treasure  under  her  pillow;  and  I  think,  myself, 
it's  better  to  have  it  all  settled  and  satisfactory  while 
the  iron's  hot,  and  you'd  probably  prefer  it  that  way, 
too;  and  she  says  she  won't  mind,  this  time,  taking 
your  check,  though  the  actual  money  would  be  far 
more  satisfactory,  because  you  know  what  women 

"Say!  He  raves  on  like  this  for  three  minutes, 
stopping  to  laugh  like  a  maniac  about  every  three 
words,  before  I  can  get  a  word  in  to  tell  him  that  I'm 
a  delicate,  high-strung  organization  myself,  if  you 
come  right  down  to  it,  and  I  can't  stand  there  in  my 
nightgown  listening  to  a  string  of  nonsense.  He 
chokes  and  says:  'What  nonsense?'  And  I  ask  him 
does  he  think  I'd  pay  a  thousand  dollars  out  on  a 
game  I  hadn't  overlooked?  And  he  says  didn't  I 
agree  to  in  the  presence  of  witnesses,  and  the  cards 
is  laid  out  right  there  now  on  the  dining-room  table 
if  I  got  the  least  suspicion  the  game  wasn't  played 
fair,  and  will  I  come  up  and  look  for  myself!  And  I 
says  'Not  in  a  thousand  years!'  Because  what  does 
he  think  I  am ! 

"So  then  Mis'  Wales  she  breaks  in  and  says: 
'Listen,  Mr.  Floud!  You  are  taking  a  most  peculiar 
attitude  in  this  matter.  You  perhaps  don't  under 
stand  that  it  means  a  great  deal  to  dear  Leonard  and 
me — try  to  think  calmly  and  summon  your  finer 
instincts.  You  said  I  could  not  only  play  with  my 
own  cards  at  any  hour  of  the  night  or  day,  but  in  my 
own  home;  and  I  chose  to  play  here,  because  condi- 


270          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

tions  are  more  harmonious  to  my  psychic  powers ' 

And  so  on  and  so  on;  and  she  can't  understand  my 
peculiar  attitude  once  more,  till  I  thought  I'd  bust. 

"It  was  lucky  she  had  the  telephone  between  us 
or  I  should  certainly  of  been  pinched  for  a  crime  of 
violence.  But  I  got  kind  of  collected  in  my  senses 
and  I  told  her  I  already  had  been  pushed  as  far  as  I 
could  be;  and  then  I  think  of  a  good  one:  I  ask  her 
does  she  know  what  General  Sherman  said  war  was? 
So  she  says,  'No;  but  what  has  that  got  to  do  with 
it?'  'Well,  listen  carefully!'  I  says.  'You  tell 
dear  Leonard  that  I  am  now  saying  my  last  word  in 
this  matter  by  telling  you  both  to  go  to  war — and 
then  ask  him  to  tell  you  right  out  what  Sherman  said 
war  was.' 

"I  listened  a  minute  longer  for  her  scream,  and 
when  it  come,  like  sweet  music  or  something,  I  went 
to  bed  again  and  slept  happy.  Yes,  sir;  I  got  even 
with  them  sharks  all  right,  though  she's  telling  all 
over  town  this  morning  that  I  have  repudiated  a  debt 
of  honour  and  she's  going  to  have  that  thousand  if 
there's  any  law  in  the  land;  and  anyway,  she'll  get 
me  took  up  for  conducting  a  common  gambling  house. 
Gee !  It  makes  me  feel  good ! ' ' 

That's  the  way  with  this  old  Egbert  boy;  nothing 
ever  seems  to  faze  him  long. 

"How  much  do  you  lose  on  the  night?"  I  ask  him. 

"Well,  the  bar  was  a  great  help,"  he  says,  very 
chipper;  "so  I  only  lose  about  fourteen  hundred 
all  told.  It'll  make  a  nice  bunch  for  the  Belgians, 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          271 

and  the  few  dollars  you  ladies  made  at  your  cheap 
booths  will  help  some." 

"How  will  your  fourteen  hundred  lost  be  any  help 
to  the  Belgians?"  I  wanted  to  know;  and  he  looked 
at  me  very  superior  and  as  crafty  as  a  fox. 

"Simple  enough!"  he  says  in  a  lofty  manner.  "I 
was  going  to  give  what  I  win,  wasn't  I?  So  why 
wouldn't  I  give  what  I  lose?  That's  plain  enough 
for  any  one  but  a  woman  to  see,  ain't  it?  I  give  Mis' 
Ballard,  the  treasurer,  a  check  for  fourteen  hundred 
not  an  hour  ago.  I  told  you  I  knew  how  to  run  one 
of  these  grafts,  didn't  I?  Didn't  I,  now?  " 

Wasn't  that  just  like  the  old  smarty?  You  never 
know  when  you  got  him  nailed.  And  feeling  so  good 
over  getting  even  with  the  Wales  couple  that  had 
about  a  thousand  dollars  of  his  money  that  very 
minute ! 

Still  from  the  dimly  lighted  bunk  house  came  the 
wail  of  Sandy  Sawtelle  to  make  vibrant  the  night. 
He  had  returned  to  his  earlier  song  after  intermittent 
trifling  with  an  extensive  repertoire: 

There's  a  broken  heart  for  every  light  on  Broadway, 
A  million  tears  for  every  gleam,  they  say. 
Those  lights  above  you  think  nothing  of  you; 
It9s  those  who  love  you  that  have  to  pay.     .     .     . 

It  was  the  wail  of  one  thwarted  and  perishing. 
"Ain't  it  the  sobbing  tenor?"  remarked  his  em- 


272  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

ployer.  "But  you  can't  blame  him  after  the  killing 
he  made  before.  Of  course  he'll  get  to  town  sooner 
or  later  and  play  this  fourteen  number,  being  that 
the  new  reform  administration,  with  Lon  Price  as 
Mayor,  is  now  safely  elected  and  the  game  has 
opened  up  again.  Yes,  sir;  he's  nutty  about  stitches 
in  a  mule.  I  wouldn't  put  it  past  him  that  he  had 
old  Jerry  kicked  on  purpose  to-day!" 


vn 

KATE;  OR,  UP  FROM  THE  DEPTHS 

r  |  ^HIS  day  I  fared  abroad  with  Ma  Pettengill 
1  over  wide  spaces  of  the  Arrowhead  Ranch. 

M  Between  fields  along  the  river  bottom  were 
gates  distressingly  crude;  clumsy,  hingeless  panels  of 
board  fence,  which  I  must  dismount  and  lift  about 
by  sheer  brawn  of  shoulder.  Such  gates  combine 
the  greatest  weight  with  the  least  possible  exercise  of 
man's  inventive  faculties,  and  are  named,  not  too 
subtly,  the  Armstrong  gate.  This,  indeed,  is  the 
American  beauty  of  ranch  humour,  a  flower  of  im 
perishable  fragrance  handed  to  the  visitor — who  does 
the  lifting — with  guarded  drollery  or  triumphant 
snicker,  as  may  be.  Buck  Devine  or  Sandy  Sawtelle 
will  achieve  the  mot  with  an  aloof  austerity  that 
abates  no  jot  unto  the  hundredth  repetition;  while 
Lew  Wee,  Chinese  cook  of  the  Arrowhead,  fails  not  to 
brighten  it  with  a  nervous  giggle,  impairing  its  vocal 
correctness,  moreover,  by  calling  it  the  "Armcat- 
chum"  gate. 

Ma  Pettengill  was  more  versatile  this  day.  The 
first  gate  I  struggled  with  she  called  Armstrong  in  a 
manner  dryly  descriptive;  for  the  second  she  man 
aged  a  humorous  leer  to  illumine  the  term;  for  the 

273 


274          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

third,  secured  with  a  garland  of  barbed  wire  that 
must  be  painfully  untwisted,  she  employed  a  still 
broader  humour.  Even  a  child  would  then  have 
known  that  calling  this  criminal  device  the  Armstrong 
gate  was  a  joke  of  uncommon  richness. 

As  I  remounted,  staunching  the  inevitable  wound 
from  barbed  wire,  I  began  to  speak  in  the  bitterly 
superior  tones  of  an  efficiency  expert  as  we  traversed 
a  field  where  hundreds  of  white-faced  Heref ords  were 
putting  on  flesh  to  their  own  ruin.  I  said  to  my 
hostess  that  I  vastly  enjoyed  lifting  a  hundred-pound 
gate — and  what  was  the  loss  of  a  little  blood  between 
old  friends,  even  when  aggravated  by  probable 
tetanus  germs?  But  had  she  ever  paused  to  com 
pute  the  money  value  of  time  lost  by  her  henchmen 
in  dismounting  to  open  these  clumsy  makeshifts? 
I  suggested  that,  even  appraising  the  one  reliable 
ranch  joke  in  all  the  world  at  a  high  figure,  she  would 
still  profit  considerably  by  putting  in  gates  that  were 
gates,  in  place  of  contrivances  that  could  be  handled 
ideally  only  by  a  retired  weight  lifter  in  barbed-wire- 
proof  armour. 

I  rapidly  calculated,  with  the  seeming  high  regard 
for  accuracy  that  marks  all  efficiency  experts,  that 
these  wretched  devices  cost  her  twenty-eight  cents 
and  a  half  each  per  diem.  Estimating  the  total  of 
them  on  the  ranch  at  one  hundred,  this  meant  to 
her  a  loss  of  twenty-eight  dollars  and  a  half  per  diem. 
I  used  per  diem  twice  to  impress  the  woman.  I  added 
that  it  was  pretty  slipshod  business  for  a  going  con- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  275 

cern,  supposing — sarcastically  now — that  the  Arrow 
head  was  a  going  concern.  Of  course,  if  it  were 
merely  a  toy  for  the  idle  rich 

She  had  let  me  talk,  as  she  will  now  and  then, 
affecting  to  be  engrossed  with  her  stock. 

"Look  at  them  white-faced  darlings!"  she  mur 
mured.  "Two  years  old  and  weighing  eleven  hun 
dred  this  minute  if  they  weigh  a  pound!" 

Then  I  saw  we  approached  a  gate  that  amazingly 
was  a  gate.  Hinges,  yes;  and  mechanical  complica 
tions,  and  a  pendant  cord  on  each  side.  I  tugged  at 
one  and  the  gate  magically  opened.  As  we  passed 
through  I  tugged  at  the  other  and  it  magically  closed. 
This  was  luxury  ineffable  to  one  who  had  laboured  with 
things  that  seemed  to  be  kept  merely  for  the  sake 
of  a  jest  that  was  never  of  the  best  and  was  staling 
with  use.  It  would  also  be,  I  hoped,  an  object  lesson 
to  my  hostess.  I  performed  the  simple  rite  in  silence, 
yet  with  a  manner  that  I  meant  to  be  eloquent,  even 
provocative.  It  was. 

"Oh,  sure!"  spoke  Ma  Pettengill.  "That  there's 
one  of  your  per-diem  gates;  and  there's  another  lead 
ing  out  of  this  field,  and  about  six  beyond — all  of  'em 
just  as  per  diem  as  this  one;  and,  also,  this  here  ranch 
you're  on  now  is  one  of  your  going  concerns."  She 
chuckled  at  this  and  repeated  it  in  a  subterranean 
rumble:  "A  going  concern — my  sakes,  yes!  It 
moved  so  fast  you  could  see  it  go,  and  now  it's 
went."  Noisily  she  relished  this  bit  of  verbal 
finesse;  then  permitted  her  fancy  again  to  trifle 


276  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

with  it.  "Yes,  sir;  this  here  going  concern  is  plumb 
gone!" 

With  active  malice  I  asked  no  question,  maintain 
ing  a  dignified  silence  as  I  lightly  manipulated  a  sec 
ond  paragon  of  gates.  The  lady  now  rumbled  con 
fidentially  to  herself,  and  I  caught  piquant  phrases; 
yet  still  I  forbore  to  question,  since  the  woman  so 
plainly  sought  to  intrigue  me.  Even  when  we 
skirted  a  clump  of  cottonwoods  and  came — through 
another  perfect  gate — upon  a  most  amazing  small  col 
lection  of  ranch  buildings,  dying  of  desertion,  I  re 
tained  perfect  control  of  a  rising  curiosity. 

By  unspoken  agreement  we  drew  rein  to  survey 
a  desolation  that  was  still  immaculate.  Stables 
and  outbuildings  were  trim  and  new,  and  pure  with 
paint.  All  had  been  swept  and  garnished;  no  un 
sightly  litter  marred  the  scene.  The  house  was  a 
suburban  villa  of  marked  pretension  and  would  have 
excited  no  comment  on  Long  Island.  In  this  valley 
of  the  mountains  it  was  nothing  short  of  spectacular. 
Only  one  item  of  decoration  hinted  an  attempt  to 
adapt  itself  to  environment:  in  the  noble  stone 
chimney  that  reared  itself  between  two  spacious 
wings  a  branding  iron  had  been  embedded.  Thus 
did  it  proclaim  itself  to  the  incredulous  hills  as  a 
ranch  house. 

Flowers  had  been  planted  along  a  gravelled  walk. 
While  I  reminded  myself  that  the  gravel  must  have 
been  imported  from  a  spot  at  least  ten  miles  distant, 
I  was  further  shocked  by  discovering  a  most  improb- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  277 

able  golf  green,  in  gloomy  survival.  Then  I  detected 
a  series  of  kennels  facing  a  wired  dog  run.  This 
was  overwhelming  in  a  country  of  simple,  steadfast 
devotion  to  the  rearing  of  cattle  for  market. 

Ma  Pettengil  now  spoke  in  a  tone  that,  for  her, 
could  be  called  hushed,  though  it  reached  me  twenty 
feet  away. 

"An  art  bungalow!"  she  said,  and  gazed  upon  it 
with  seeming  awe.  Then  she  waved  a  quirt  to  indi 
cate  this  and  the  painfully  neat  outbuildings.  "A 
toy  for  the  idle  rich — was  that  it?  Well,  you  said 
something.  This  was  one  little  per-diem  going 
concern,  all  right.  They  even  had  the  name  some 
where  round  here  worked  out  in  yellow  flowers — 
Broadmoor  it  was.  You  could  read  it  for  five  miles 
when  the  posies  got  up  There  it  is  over  on  that 
lawn.  You  can't  read  it  now  because  the  letters  are 
all  overgrown.  My  Chinaman  got  delirious  about 
that  when  he  first  seen  it  and  wanted  me  to  plant 
Arrowhead  out  in  front  of  our  house,  and  was  quite 
hurt  when  I  told  him  I  was  just  a  business  woman — 
and  a  tired  business  woman  at  that.  He  done  what 
he  could,  though,  to  show  we  was  some  class.  The 
first  time  these  folks  come  over  to  our  place  to  lunch 
he  picked  all  my  pink  carnations  to  make  a  mat  on 
the  table,  and  spelled  out  Arrowhead  round  it  in 
ripe  olives,  with  a  neat  frame  of  celery  inclosing 
same.  Yes,  sir!" 

This  was  too  much.  It  now  seemed  time  to  ask 
questions,  and  I  did  so  in  a  winning  manner;  but  so 


278  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

deaf  in  her  backward  musing  was  the  woman  that 
I  saw  it  must  all  come  in  its  own  way. 

"We  got  to  make  up  over  that  bench  yet,"  she 
said  at  last;  and  we  rode  out  past  the  ideal  stable — 
its  natty  weather  vane  forever  pointing  the  wind  to 
the  profit  of  no  man — through  another  gate  of  su 
perb  cunning,  and  so  once  more  to  an  understandable 
landscape,  where  sane  cattle  grazed.  Here  I  threw 
off  the  depression  that  comes  upon  one  in  places 
where  our  humankind  so  plainly  have  been  and  are 
not.  Again  I  questioned  of  Broadmoor  and  its  van 
ished  people. 

The  immediate  results  were  fragmentary,  serving 
to  pique  rather  than  satisfy;  a  series  of  hors  d'oeuvres 
that  I  began  to  suspect  must  form  the  whole  repast. 
On  the  verge  of  coherence  the  woman  would  break 
off  to  gloat  over  a  herd  of  thoroughbred  Durhams 
or  a  bunch  of  sportive  Hereford  calves  or  a  field 
teeming  with  the  prized  fruits  of  intermarriage 
between  these  breeds.  Or  she  found  diversion  in 
stupendous  stacks  of  last  summer's  hay,  well  fenced 
from  pillage;  or  grounds  for  criticising  the  sloth  of 
certain  of  her  henchmen,  who  had  been  told  as  plain 
as  anything  that  "that  there  line  fance"  had  to  be 
finished  by  Saturday;  no  two  ways  about  it!  She 
repeated  the  language  in  which  she  had  conveyed 
this  decision.  There  could  have  been  no  grounds 
for  misunderstanding  it. 

And  thus  the  annals  of  Broadmoor  began  to  drib 
ble  to  me,  overlaid  too  frequently  for  my  taste  with 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  279 

philosophic  reflections  at  large  upon  what  a  lone, 
defenceless  woman  could  expect  in  this  world — 
irrelevant,  pointed  wonderings  as  to  whether  a 
party  letting  on  he  was  a  good  ranch  hand  really 
expected  to  perform  any  labour  for  his  fifty  a  month, 
or  just  set  round  smoking  his  head  off  and  see  which 
could  tell  the  biggest  lie;  or  mebbe  make  an  excuse 
for  some  light  job  like  oiling  the  twenty-two  sets  of 
mule  harness  over  again,  when  they  had  already  been 
oiled  right  after  haying.  Furthermore,  any  woman 
not  a  born  fool  would  get  out  of  the  business  the 
first  chance  she  got,  this  one  often  being  willing  to 
sell  for  a  mutilated  dollar,  except  for  not  wishing 
financial  ruin  or  insanity  to  other  parties. 

Yet  a  few  details  definitely  emerged.  <fHer"  name 
was  called  Posnett,  though  a  party  would  never  guess 
this  if  he  saw  it  in  print,  because  it  was  spelled 
Postlethwaite.  Yes,  sir!  All  on  account  of  having 
gone  to  England  from  Boston  and  found  out  that  was 
how  you  said  it,  though  Cousin  Egbert  Floud  had 
tried  to  be  funny  about  it  when  shown  the  name  in 
the  Red  Gap  Recorder.  The  item  said  the  family 
had  taken  apartments  at  Red  Gap's  premier  hotel 
de  luxe,  the  American  House;  and  Cousin  Egbert, 
being  told  a  million  dollars  was  bet  that  he  never 
could  guess  how  the  name  was  pronounced  in  English, 
he  up  and  said  you  couldn't  fool  him;  that  it  was 
pronounced  Chumley,  which  was  just  like  the  old 
smarty — only  he  give  in  that  he  was  surprised  when 
told  how  it  really  was  pronounced;  and  he  said  if  a 


280          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

party's  name  was  Postlethwaite  why  couldn't  they 
come  out  and  say  so  like  a  man,  instead  of  beating 
round  the  bush  like  that?  All  of  which  was  promis 
ing  enough;  but  then  came  the  Hereford  yearlings 
to  effect  a  breach  of  continuity. 

These  being  enough  admired,  I  had  next  to  be  told 
that  I  wouldn't  believe  how  many  folks  was  certain 
she  had  retired  to  the  country  because  she  was  lazy, 
just  keeping  a  few  head  of  cattle  for  diversion — she 
that  had  six  thousand  acres  of  land  under  fence,  and 
had  made  a  going  concern  per  diem  of  it  for  thirty 
years,  even  if  parties  did  make  cracks  about  her  gates; 
but  hardly  ever  getting  a  good  night's  sleep  through 
having  a  "passel"  of  men  to  run  it  that  you  couldn't 
depend  on — though  God  only  knew  where  you  could 
find  any  other  sort — the  minute  your  back  was  turned. 

A  fat,  sleek,  prosperous  male,  clad  in  expensive 
garments,  and  wearing  a  derby  hat  and  too  much 
jewellery,  became  somehow  personified  in  this  tirade. 
I  was  led  to  picture  him  a  residuary  legatee  who  had 
never  done  a  stroke  of  work  in  his  life,  and  believed 
that  no  one  else  ever  did  except  from  a  sportive  per 
versity.  I  was  made  to  hear  him  tell  her  that  she, 
Mrs.  Ly sander  John  Pettengill,  was  leading  the  ideal 
life  on  her  country  place;  and,  by  Jove!  he  often 
thought  of  doing  the  same  thing  himself — get  a  nice 
little  spot  in  this  beautiful  country,  with  some  green 
meadows,  and  have  bands  of  large  handsome  cattle 
strolling  about  in  the  sunlight,  so  he  could  forget  the 
world  and  its  strife  in  the  same  idyllic  peace  she  must 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          281 

be  finding.  Or  if  he  didn't  tell  her  this,  then  he  was 
sure  to  have  a  worthless  son  or  nephew  that  her  ranch 
would  be  just  the  place  for;  and,  of  course,  she  would 
be  glad  to  take  him  on  and  make  something  of  him — 
that  is,  so  the  lady  now  regrettably  put  it,  as  he  had 
shown  he  wasn't  worth  a  damn  for  anything  else, 
why  couldn't  she  make  a  cattleman  of  him? 

"Yes,  sir;  that's  what  I  get  from  these  here  visitors 
that  are  enchanted  by  the  view.  Either  they  think 
my  ranch  is  a  reform  school  for  poor  chinless  Chester, 
that  got  led  away  by  bad  companions  and  can't  say 
no,  or  they  think,  like  you  said,  that  it's  just  a  toy 
for  the  idle  rich.  Show  'em  a  shoe  factory  or  a  steel 
works  and  they  can  understand  it's  a  business  prop 
osition;  but  a  ranch Shucks!  They  think  I've 

done  my  day's  work  when  I  ride  out  on  a  gentle 
horse  and  look  pleased  at  the  landscape." 

Again  were  we  diverted.  A  dozen  alien  beeves 
fed  upon  the  Arrowhead  preserves.  Did  I  see  that 
wattle  brand — the  jug-handle  split?  That  was  the 
Timmins  brand — old  Safety  First  Timmins.  There 
must  be  a  break  in  his  fence  at  the  upper  end  of  the 
field.  Made  it  himself  likely.  Wouldn't  she  give  the 
old  penny-pincher  hell  if  she  had  him  here?  She 
would,  indeed!  Continuous  muttering  of  a  rugged 
character  for  half  a  mile  of  jog  trot. 

Then  again: 

"Cousin  Egbert  got  all  fussed  up  in  his  mind  about 
the  name  and  always  called  her  Postle-nut.  He  don't 
seem  to  have  a  brain  for  such  things.  But  she  didn't 


282  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

mind.  I  give  her  credit  for  that.  She  was  fifty 
if  she  was  a  day,  but  very,  very  blond;  laboratory 
stuff,  of  course.  You'd  of  called  her  a  superblonde, 
I  guess.  And  haggard  and  wrinkled  in  the  face;  but 
she  took  good  care  of  that,  too — artist's  materials. 

"You  know  old  Pete — that  Indian  you  see  cutting 
up  wood  back  on  the  place.  Pete  took  a  long  look 
at  her  and  named  her  the  Painted  Desert.  You  al 
ways  hear  say  an  Indian  hasn't  got  any  sense  of 
humour.  I  don't  know;  Pete  was  sure  being  either  a 
humourist  or  a  poet.  However,  this  here  lady  handed 
me  a  new  one  about  my  business.  She  thought  it 
was  merely  an  outdoor  sport.  I  never  could  get 
that  out  of  her  head.  Even  when  she  left  she  says 
she  knows  it's  ripping  good  sport,  but  it's  such  a 
terrific  drain  on  one's  income,  and  I  must  be  quite 
mad  about  ranching  to  keep  it  up.  I  said,  yes;  I 
got  quite  mad  about  it  sometimes,  and  let  it  go  at 
that.  What  was  the  use?" 

A  voiceless  interval  while  we  climbed  a  trail  to  the 
timbered  bench  where  fence  posts  were  being  cut  by 
half  a  dozen  of  the  Arrowhead  forces.  Two  of  these 
were  swiftly  detached  and  bade  to  repair  the  break 
in  the  fence  by  which  one  Timmins  was  now  profiting, 
the  entire  six  being  first  regaled  with  a  brief  but 
pithy  character  analysis  of  the  offender,  portraying 
him  as  a  loathsome  biological  freak;  headless,  I 
gathered,  and  with  the  acquisitive  instincts  of  a  trade 
rat. 

Then  we  rounded  back  on  our  way  to  the  Arrow- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  283 

head  ranch  house.  Five  miles  up  the  narrowing 
valley  we  could  see  its  outposts  and  its  smoke.  Far 
below  us  the  spick-and-span  buildings  of  deserted 
Broadmoor  glittered  newly,  demanding  that  I  be 
told  more  of  them.  Yet  for  the  five-mile  ride  I 
added,  as  I  thought,  no  item  to  my  slender  stock. 
Instead,  when  we  had  descended  from  the  bench  and 
were  again  in  fields  where  the  gates  might  be  opened 
only  by  galling  effort,  I  learned  apparently  irrelevant 
facts  concerning  Egbert  Floud's  pet  kitten. 

"Yes,  sir;  he's  just  like  any  old  maid  with  that  cat. 
'Kitty!'  here  and  'Kitty!'  there;  and  Toor  Kitty, 
did  I  forget  to  warm  its  milk?'  And  so  on.  It  was 
give  to  him  two  years  ago  by  Jeff  Tuttle's  littlest 
girl,  Irene;  and  he  didn't  want  it  at  first,  but  him  and 
Irene  is  great  friends,  so  he  pretended  he  was  crazy 
about  it  and  took  it  off  in  his  overcoat  pocket,  think 
ing  it  would  die  anyway,  because  it  was  only  skin  and 
bones.  Whenever  it  tried  to  purr  you'd  think  it  was 
going  to  shake  all  its  timbers  loose.  His  house  is 
just  over  on  the  other  side  of  Arrowhead  Pass  there, 
and  I  saw  the  kitten  the  first  day  be  brought  it  up, 
kind  of  light  brown  and  yellow  in  colour,  with  some 
gray  on  the  left  shoulder. 

Well,  the  minute  I  see  these  markings  I  recog 
nized  'em  and  remembered  something,  and  I  says 
right  off  that  he's  got  some  cat  there;  and  he  says  how 
do  I  know?  And  I  tell  him  that  there  kitten  has  got 
at  least  a  quarter  wildcat  in  it.  Its  grandmother, 
or  mebbe  its  great-grandmother,  was  took  up  to  the 


284  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Tuttle  Ranch  when  there  wasn't  another  cat  within 
forty  miles,  and  it  got  to  running  round  nights;  and 
quite  a  long  time  after  that  they  found  it  with  a  mess 
of  kittens  in  a  box  out  in  the  harness  room.  One 
look  at  their  feet  and  ears  was  all  you'd  want  to  see 
that  their  pa  was  a  bobcat.  They  all  become  famous 
fighting  characters,  and  was  marked  just  like  this 
descendant  of  theirs  that  Cousin  Egbert  has.  And, 
say,  I  was  going  on  like  this,  not  suspecting  any 
thing  except  that  I  was  giving  him  some  interesting 
news  about  the  family  history  of  this  pet  of  his,  when 
he  grabs  the  beast  up  and  cuddles  it,  and  says  I  had 
ought  to  be  ashamed  of  myself,  talking  that  way 
about  a  poor  little  innocent  kitten  that  never  done 
me  a  stroke  of  harm  Yes,  sir;  he  was  right  fiery. 

"I  don't  know  how  he  come  to  take  it  that  cross 
way,  for  he  hadn't  thought  highly  of  the  thing  up  to 
that  moment.  But  some  way  it  seemed  to  him  I  was 
talking  scandal  about  his  pet — kind  of  clouding  up 
its  ancestry,  if  you  know  what  I  mean.  He  didn't 
seem  to  get  any  broad  view  of  it  at  all.  You'd  al 
most  think  I'd  been  reporting  an  indiscretion  in  some 
member  of  his  family.  Can  you  beat  it?  Heating 
up  that  way  over  a  puny  kitten,  six  inches  from  tip 
to  tip,  that  he'd  been  thinking  of  as  a  pest  and  only 
taken  to  please  Irene  Tuttle!  So  he  starts  in  from 
that  minute  to  doctor  it  up  and  nurture  it  with  canned 
soup  and  delicacies;  and  every  time  I  see  him  after 
that  he'd  look  indignant  and  say  what  great  hands 
for  spreading  gossip  us  women  are,  and  his  kitten 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  285 

ain't  got  no  more  bobcat  in  its  veins  than  what  I 
have. 

"He's  a  stubborn  old  toad.  Irene  had  told  him 
the  kitten's  name  was  Kate;  so  he  kept  right  on 
calling  it  that  even  after  it  become  incongruous,  as 
you  might  say.  Judge  Ballard  was  up  here  on  a  fish 
ing  trip  one  time  and  heard  him  calling  it  Kate,  and 
he  says  to  Egbert:  Why  call  it  Kate  when  it  ain't? 
Egbert  says  that  was  the  name  little  Irene  give  it  and 
it's  too  much  trouble  to  think  up  another.  The 
Judge  says,  Oh,  no;  not  so  much  trouble,  being  that 
he  could  just  change  the  name  swiftly  from  Kate  to 
Cato,  thus  meeting  all  conventional  requirements 
with  but  slight  added  labour.  But  Egbert  says  there's 
the  sentiment  to  think  of — whatever  he  meant  by 
that;  and  if  you  was  to  go  over  there  to-day  and  he 
was  home  you'd  likely  hear  him  say:  'Yes;  Kate  is 
certainly  some  cat !  Why,  he's  at  least  half  bobcat — 
mebbe  three-quarters;  and  the  fightingest  devil!' 
What's  that?  Yes;  he's  changed  completely  round 
about  the  wildcat  strain.  He's  proud  of  it.  If  I 
was  to  say  now  it  was  only  a  quarter  bob  he'd  be  as 
mad  as  he  was  at  first;  he  says  anybody  can  see  it's 
at  least  half  bob.  What  changed  him?  Oh,  well, 
we're  too  near  home.  Some  other  time." 

So  it  befell  that  not  until  we  sat  out  for  a  splendid 
sunset  that  evening  did  I  learn  in  an  orderly  manner 
of  Postleth  waite  vicissitudes .  Ma  Pettengill  built  her 
first  cigarette  with  tender  solicitude;  and  this,  in 
consideration  of  her  day's  hard  ride,  I  permitted  her 


286  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

to  burn  in  relaxed  silence.  But  when  her  trained 
fingers  began  to  combine  paper  and  tobacco  for  the 
second  I  mentioned  Broadmoor,  Postlethwaite,  Pos- 
nett,  and  parties  in  general  that  come  round  the 
tired  business  woman,  harassed  with  the  countless 
vexations  of  a  large  cattle  ranch,  telling  her  how  wise 
she  has  been  to  retire  to  this  sylvan  quietude,  where 
she  can  dream  away  her  life  in  peace.  She  started 
easily : 

"That's  it;  they  always  intimate  that  running  a 
ranch  is  mere  cream  puffs  compared  to  a  regular 
business,  and  they'd  like  to  do  the  same  thing  to 
morrow  if  only  they  was  ready  to  retire  from  active 
life.  Mebbe  they  get  the  idea  from  these  here  back- 
to-nature  stories  about  a  brokendown  bookkeeper, 
sixty-seven  years  old,  with  neuritis  and  gastric 
complications  and  bum  eyesight,  and  a  wife  that 
ain't  ever  seen  a  well  day;  so  they  take  every  cent 
of  their  life  savings  of  eighty-three  dollars  and  settle 
on  an  abandoned  farm  in  Connecticut  and  clear 
nine  thousand  dollars  the  first  year  raising  the  Little 
Giant  caper  for  boiled  mutton.  There  certainly 
ought  to  be  a  law  against  such  romantic  trifling. 
In  the  first  place,  think  of  a  Connecticut  farmer 
abandoning  anything  worth  money!  Old  Timmins 
comes  from  Connecticut.  Any  time  that  old  leech 
abandons  a  thing,  bookkeepers  and  all  other  parties 
will  do  well  to  ride  right  along  with  him.  I  tell  you 
now " 

The  second  cigarette  was  under  way,  and  suddenly, 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          287 

without  modulation,  the  performer  was  again  on  the 
theme,  Posnett  nee  Postlethwaite. 

"Met  her  two  years  ago  in  Boston,  where  I  was 
suffering  a  brief  visit  with  my  son-in-law's  aunts. 
She  was  the  sole  widow  of  a  large  woolen  mill. 
That's  about  all  I  could  ever  make  out — couldn't 
get  any  line  on  him  to  speak  of.  The  first  time  I 
called  on  her — she  was  in  pink  silk  pyjamas,  smok 
ing  a  perfecto  cigar,  and  unpacking  a  bale  of  lion  and 
tiger  skins  she'd  shot  in  Africa,  or  some  place — she 
said  she  believed  there  would  be  fewer  unhappy  mar 
riages  in  this  world  if  women  would  only  try  more 
earnestly  to  make  a  companion  of  their  husbands; 
she  said  she'd  tried  hard  to  make  one  of  hers,  but 
never  could  get  him  interested  in  her  pursuits  and 
pastimes,  he  preferring  to  set  sullenly  at  his  desk 
making  money.  She  said  to  the  day  of  his  death  he'd 
never  even  had  a  polo  mallet  in  his  hand.  And 
wasn't  that  pitiful! 

"And  right  now  she  wanted  to  visit  a  snappy  little 
volcano  she'd  heard  about  in  South  America — only 
she  had  a  grown  son  and  daughter  she  was  trying  to 
make  companions  of,  so  they  would  love  and  trust 
her;  and  they'd  begged  her  to  do  something  nearer 
home  that  was  less  fatiguing;  and  mebbe  she  would. 
And  how  did  I  find  ranching  now?  Was  I  awfully 
keen  about  it  and  was  it  ripping  good  sport?  I  said 
yes,  to  an  extent.  She  said  she  thought  it  must  be 
ripping,  what  with  chasing  the  wild  cattle  over  hill 
and  dale  to  lasso  them,  and  firing  off  revolvers  in 


288  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

company  with  lawless  cowboys  inflamed  by  drink. 
She  went  on  to  give  me  some  more  details  of  ranch 
life,  and  got  so  worked  up  about  it  that  we  settled 
things  right  there,  she  being  a  lady  of  swift  decisions. 
She  said  it  wouldn't  be  very  exciting  for  her,  but  it 
might  be  fine  for  son  and  daughter,  and  bring  them  all 
together  in  a  more  sacred  companionship. 

"So  I  come  back  and  got  that  place  down  the  creek 
for  her,  and  she  sent  out  a  professional  architect  and 
a  landscape  gardener,  and  some  other  experts  that 
would  know  how  to  build  a  ranch  de  luxe,  and  the 
thing  was  soon  done.  And  she  sent  son  on  ahead  to 
get  slightly  acquainted  with  the  wild  life.  He  was  a 
tall  bent  thing,  about  thirty,  with  a  long  squinted 
face  and  going  hair,  and  soft,  innocent,  ginger-col 
oured  whiskers,  and  hips  so  narrow  they'd  hardly  hold 
his  belt  up.  That  rowdy  mother  of  his,  in  trying  to 
make  a  companion  of  him,  had  near  scared  him  to 
death.  He  was  permanently  frightened.  What  he 
really  wanted  to  do,  I  found  out,  was  to  study  insect 
life  and  botany  and  geography  and  arithmetic,  and  so 
on,  and  raise  orchids,  instead  of  being  killed  off  in 
a  sudden  manner  by  his  rough-neck  parent.  He 
loved  to  ride  a  horse  the  same  way  a  cat  loves  to  ride 
a  going  stove. 

"I  started  out  with  him  one  morning  to  show  him 
over  the  valley.  He  got  into  the  saddle  all  right  and 
he  meant  well,  but  that  don't  go  any  too  far  with  a 
horse.  Pretty  soon,  down  on  the  level  here,  I  started 
to  canter  a  bit.  He  grabbed  for  the  saddle  horn  and 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          289 

caught  a  handful  of  bunch  grass  fifteen  feet  to  the 
left  of  the  trail.  He  was  game  enough.  He  found 
his  glasses  and  wiped  'em  off,  and  said  it  was  too  bad 
the  mater  couldn't  have  seen  him,  because  it  would 
have  been  a  bright  spot  in  her  life. 

"Then  he  got  on  again  and  we  took  that  steep 
trail  up  the  side  of  the  canon  that  goes  over  Arrow 
head,  me  meaning  to  please  him  with  some  beautiful 
and  rugged  scenery,  where  one  false  step  might  cause 
utter  ruin.  It  didn't  work,  though.  After  we  got 
pretty  well  up  to  the  rim  of  the  canon  he  looks  down 
and  says  he  supposes  they  could  recover  one  if  one 
fell  over  there.  I  says:  *  Oh,  yes;  they  could  recover 
one.  They'd  get  you,  all  right.  Of  course  you 
wouldn't  look  like  anything!' 

"He  shudders  at  that  and  gets  off  to  lead  his  horse, 
begging  me  to  do  the  same.  I  said  I  never  tried  to  do 
anything  a  horse  could  do  better,  and  stayed  on. 
Then  he  got  confidential  and  told  me  a  lot  of  inter 
esting  crimes  this  mater  of  his  had  committed  in  her 
mad  efforts  to  make  a  companion  of  him.  Once 
she'd  tramped  on  the  gas  of  a  ninety-horsepower 
racer  and  socked  him  against  a  stone  wall  at  a  turn 
some  fool  had  made  in  the  road;  and  another  time  she 
near  drowned  him  in  the  Arctic  Ocean  when  she  was 
off  there  for  the  polar-bear  hunting;  and  she'd  got 
him  well  clawed  by  a  spotted  leopard  in  India,  that 
was  now  almost  the  best  skin  in  her  collection;  and 
once  in  Switzerland  he  fell  off  the  side  of  an  Alp  she 
was  making  him  climb,  causing  her  to  be  very  short 


290          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

with  him  all  day  because  it  delayed  the  trip.  Tied  to 
a  rope  he  was  and  hanging  out  there  over  nothing  for 
about  fifteen  minutes — he  must  have  looked  like  a 
sash  weight. 

"Then  he  told  about  learning  to  run  a  motor  car 
all  by  himself,  just  to  please  the  mater.  The  first 
time  he  made  the  sharp  turns  round  their  country 
house  he  took  nine  shingles  off  the  corner  and  crum 
pled  a  fender  like  it  was  tissue  paper;  but  he  stuck  to 
it  till  he  got  the  score  down  to  two  or  three  shingles 
only.  He  seemed  right  proud  of  that,  like  it  was 
bogey  for  the  course,  as  you  might  say.  He  wasn't 
the  greatest  humourist  in  the  world,  being  too  high- 
minded,  but  he  appealed  to  all  my  better  instincts;  he 
was  trying  so  hard  to  make  the  grade  out  of  respect 
for  his  bedizened  and  homicidal  mother. 

"And  his  poor  sister,  that  come  along  later,  was 
very  much  like  him,  being  severe  of  outline  and  wear 
ing  the  same  kind  of  spectacles,  and  not  fussing  much 
about  the  fripperies  of  dress  that  engross  so  many  of 
our  empty-headed  sex  and  get  'em  the  notice  of  the 
male.  Her  complexion  was  brutally  honest,  which 
was  about  all  her  very  best- wishers  could  say  for  it, 
but  she  was  kind-hearted  and  earnest,  and  thought  a 
good  deal  about  the  real  or  inner  meaning  of  life. 
What  she  really  yearned  for  was  to  stay  in  Boston 
and  go  to  concerts,  holding  the  music  on  her  lap  and 
checking  off  the  notes  with  a  gold  pencil  when  the 
fiddlers  played  them.  I  watched  her  do  it  one  night. 
I  don't  know  what  her  notion  was,  keeping  cases  on 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          291 

the  orchestra  that  way;  but  it  seemed  to  give  her  a 
secret  satisfaction.  She  was  also  interested  in  bird 
life  and  other  studies  of  a  high  character,  and  she 
didn't  want  to  be  made  a  companion  of  by  her  rabid 
parent  any  more  than  brother  did.  They  was  just  a 
couple  of  lambkins  born  to  a  tiger. 

"Pretty  soon  the  ranch  buildings  was  all  complete 
and  varnished  and  polished,  like  you  seen  to-day,  and 
the  family  moved  in  with  all  kinds  of  uniformed  ser 
vants  that  looked  unhappy  and  desperate.  They 
had  a  pained  butler  in  a  dress  suit  that  never  once  set 
foot  outside  the  house  the  whole  five  months  they 
was  here.  He'd  of  been  thought  too  gloomy  for  good 
taste,  even  at  a  funeral.  He  had  me  nervous  every 
time  I  went  there,  thinking  any  minute  he  was  going 
to  break  down  and  sob. 

"And  this  lady  loses  no  time  making  companions 
of  her  children  that  didn't  want  to  be.  First  she  tried 
to  make  'em  chase  steers  on  horseback.  A  fact! 
That  was  one  of  her  ideas  of  ranch  life.  When  I 
asked  her  what  she  was  going  to  stock  her  ranch  with 
she  said  didn't  I  have  some  good  heads  of  stock  I 
could  sell  her?  And  I  said  yes,  I  had  some  good 
heads,  and  showed  her  a  bunch  of  my  thoroughbreds, 
thinking  none  but  the  best  would  satisfy  her. 
She  looked  'em  over  with  a  glittering  eye  and  said 
they  was  too  fat  to  run  well.  I  didn't  get  her.  I 
said  it  was  true;  I  hadn't  raised  'em  for  speed.  I  said 
I  didn't  have  an  animal  on  the  place  that  could  hit 
better  than  three  miles  an  hour,  and  not  that  for 


292  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

long.  I  cheerfully  admitted  I  didn't  have  a  thorough 
bred  on  the  place  that  wouldn't  be  a  joke  on  any 
track  in  the  country;  but  I  wanted  to  know  what  of  it. 

"How  do  you  get  any  sport  out  of  them/  de 
mands  the  lady,  'if  they  can't  give  you  a  jolly  good 
chase?' 

"That's  what  she  asked  me  in  so  many  words.  I 
says,  does  she  aim  to  breed  racing  cattle?  And  she 
says,  where  will  the  sport  be  with  creatures  all  out  of 
condition  with  fat,  like  mine  are?  It  took  me  about 
ten  minutes  to  get  her  idea,  it  was  that  heinous  or 
criminal.  When  I  did  get  it  I  sent  her  to  old  Safety 
First;  and  what  does  she  do  but  buy  a  herd  of  twenty 
yearling  steers  from  the  old  crook!  Scrubby  little 
runts  that  had  been  raised  out  in  the  hills  and  was  all 
bone  and  muscle,  and  any  one  of  'em  able  to  do  a  mile 
in  four  minutes  flat,  I  guess. 

"Old  Safety  was  tickled  to  death  at  first  when  he 
put  off  this  refuse  on  her  at  a  price  not  much  more  than 
double  what  they  would  have  brought  in  a  tanyard, 
which  was  all  they'd  ever  be  good  for  except  bone  fer 
tilizer,  mebbe;  but  he  was  sick  unto  death  when  he 
found  they  was  just  what  she  wanted,  the  skinnier  the 
better  and  he  could  have  got  anything  he  asked  for 
'em.  He  says  to  me  afterward  why  don't  I  train 
some  of  mine  and  trim  her  good?  But  I  told  him 
I'm  cinched  for  hell,  anyway,  and  don't  have  to  make 
it  tighter  by  torturing  poor  dumb  brutes. 

"  That's  what  it  amounted  to.  Having  got  Angora 
chaps  and  cowboy  hats  for  herself  and  offsprings, 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  293 

what  do  they  do  but  get  on  ponies  and  chase  this 
herd  all  over  creation,  whirling  their  ropes,  yelling, 
shooting  in  the  air — just  like  you  see  on  any  well- 
conducted  ranch.  Once  in  a  while  the  old  lady 
herself,  being  a  demon  rider,  would  rope  an  animal 
and  fetch  it  down;  but  brother  and  sister  was  very 
careful  not  to  tangle  their  own  ropes  on  anything. 
They  didn't  shoot  their  guns  with  any  proper  spirit, 
either;  and  when  they  tried  to  yip  like  cowboys  they 
sounded  like  rabbits.  And  brother  having  to  smoke 
brown-paper  cigarettes,  which  he  hated  like  poison 
and  had  trouble  in  rolling! 

"Mother  could  roll  'em,  all  right — do  it  with  one 
hand.  And  she  urged  sister  to;  but  sister  rebelled 
for  once.  The  old  lady  admitted  this  was  due  to  a 
fault  in  her  early  training.  It  seems  her  grand 
mother  had  been  one  of  the  old-fashioned  sort;  and, 
having  studied  the  modern  young  woman  of  society 
in  Boston  and  New  York,  she'd  promised  sister  a 
string  of  pearls  if  she  didn't  either  smoke  or  drink  till 
her  twenty -first  birthday.  Sister  had  not  only  won 
the  pearls  but  had  come  on  to  twenty-eight  without 
being  like  other  young  girls  of  the  day,  and  wasn't 
going  to  begin  now.  So  ma  and  brother  had  to  do  all 
the  smoking. 

"After  a  fine  morning's  run  following  the  steers 
they'd  like  as  not  have  a  little  branding  in  the  after 
noon,  the  old-fashioned  kind  that  ain't  done  in  the 
higher  ranch  circles  any  more,  where  a  couple  of  silly 
punchers  rope  an  animal  fore  and  aft  and  throw  it, 


294  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

thereby  setting  it  back  at  least  four  months  in  its 
growth.  The  old  lady  was  puzzled  again  by  me  hav 
ing  my  branding  done  in  a  chute,  where  the  poor 
things  ain't  worried  more  than  is  necessary.  I  bet 
she  thought  I  was  a  short  sport,  not  doing  a  thing  on 
my  place  that  would  look  well  in  a  moving  picture. 
She  got  a  lot  of  ripping  sport  out  of  this  branding. 
Made  no  difference  if  they  was  already  branded, 
they  got  it  again;  she'd  brand  'em  over  and  over. 
Two  or  three  of  that  herd  got  it  so  often  that  they 
looked  like  these  leather  suitcases  parties  bring  back 
from  Europe  stuck  all  over  with  hotel  labels. 

"Well,  this  branch  of  sport  lasted  quite  a  while, 
with  them  steers  developing  speed  every  day  till  they 
got  too  fast  for  any  one  but  the  old  lady.  Brother 
and  sister  would  be  left  far  behind,  or  mebbe  get 
stacked  up  and  discouraged  or  sprained  for  the  day. 
The  old  dame  said  it  was  disheartening,  indeed,  trying 
to  make  companions  of  one's  children  when  they 
showed  such  a  low  order  of  intelligence  for  it.  Still, 
she  was  fair-minded;  so  she  had  a  golf  links  made, 
and  put  'em  at  that.  She  wouldn't  play  herself, 
saying  it  was  an  effeminate  game,  good  for  fat  old 
men  or  schoolboys,  but  mebbe  her  chits  would 
benefit  by  it  and  get  a  taste  for  proper  sports,  where 
you  can  break  a  bone  now  and  then  by  not  using  care. 

"But  golf  wasn't  much  better.  Sister  would  carry 
a  book  of  poetry  with  her  and  read  it  as  she  loafed 
from  one  hit  to  another.  The  old  lady  near  shed 
tears  at  the  sight.  And  brother  was  about  as  bad, 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          295 

getting  hypnotized  by  passing  insect  life  and  for 
getting  his  score  while  prodding  some  new  kind  of 
bug. 

"The  old  lady  said  I'd  never  believe  what  a  care 
and  responsibility  children  was.  She  had  wanted 
'em  to  go  in  for  ranching  and  be  awfully  keen  about 
it,  and  look  how  they  acted!  Still,  she  wouldn't 
give  up.  She  suggested  polo  next;  but  sister  said  it 
wasn't  a  lady's  game,  making  no  dem,and  upon  the 
higher  attributes  of  womanhood,  and  brother  said  he 
might  go  in  for  it  if  she'd  let  him  play  his  on  a 
bicycle,  as  being  more  reliable  or  stauncher  than  a 
pony. 

"So  she  throws  up  her  hands  in  despair,  but  thinks 
hard  again;  and  at  last  she  says  she  has  the  right  sport 
for  'em  and  why  didn't  she  think  of  it  before !  This 
new  idea  is  to  bring  up  her  pack  of  prize-winning 
beagles,  the  sport  being  full  of  excitement,  and  yet 
safe  enough  for  all  concerned  if  they'll  look  where 
they  walk  and  not  stop  to  read  slushy  poems  or  col 
lect  insect  life.  Sister  and  brother  said  beagles,  by 
all  means,  like  drowning  sailors  clutching  at  a  straw 
or  something;  and  the  old  lady  sent  off  a  telegram. 

"I  admit  I  didn't  know  what  kind  of  a  game  beagles 
was,  but  I  didn't  betray  the  fact  when  she  told  me 
about  it.  I  was  over  to  Egbert  Floud's  place  next 
day  and  I  asked  him.  But  he  didn't  know  and  he 
couldn't  even  get  the  name  right.  He  says:  'You 
mean  beetles.'  I  says,  'Not  at  all';  that  it's  beagles. 
Then  he  says  I  must  of  got  the  name  twisted,  and 


296  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

probably  it's  one  of  these  curly  horns.  That's  as 
close  as  he  ever  did  come  to  the  name;  and  until  he 
actually  saw  the  things  he  insisted  they  was  either 
something  to  blow  on  or  something  that  crawled. 
'Mark  my  words,'  he  says,  'they're  either  a  horn  or  a 
bug;  and  I  wonder  what  this  here  blond  guy  will  be 
doing  next.'  So  I  saw  nothing  sensible  was  to  be 
had  out  of  him,  and  I  left  him  there,  doddering. 

"Then  in  about  ten  days,  which  was  days  of  peace 
for  brother  and  sister,  because  they  didn't  have  to  go 
in  keenly  for  any  new  way  of  killing  themselves  off, 
what  comes  up  but  several  crates  of  beagles,  in  charge 
of  their  valet  or  tutor!  I'd  looked  forward  to  some 
thing  of  a  thrilling  or  unknown  character,  and  they 
turned  out  to  be  mere  dogs;  just  little  brown-and- 
white  dogs  that  you  wouldn't  notice  if  you  hadn't 
been  excited  by  their  names;  kind  of  yapping  mutts 
that  some  parties  would  poison  off  if  they  lived  in  the 
same  neighbourhood  with'  em.  They  all  had  names 
like  Rex  ft  and  Lady  Blessington,  and  so  on;  and 
each  one  had  cost  more  than  any  three  steers  I  had 
on  the  place.  What  do  you  think  of  that?  They 
was  yapping  in  their  kennels  when  I.  first  seen  'em, 
with  the  old  lady  as  excited  as  they  was,  and  brother 
and  sister  trying  to  look  excited  in  order  to  please 
mother,  and  at  least  looking  relieved  because  no  fatal 
ities  was  in  immediate  prospect. 

"I  listened  to  the  noise  a  while  and  acted  nice  by 
saying  they  was  undoubtedly  the  very  finest  beagles 
I'd  ever  laid  eyes  on — which  was  the  simple  God's 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          297 

truth;  and  then  I  says  won't  she  take  one  out  of  the 
cage  and  let  him  beagle  some,  me  not  having  any  idea 
what  it  would  be  like?  But  the  old  lady  says  not 
yet,  because  the  costumes  ain't  come.  I  thought  at 
first  it  was  the  pups  that  had  to  be  dressed  up,  but  it 
seems  it  was  costumes  for  her  and  brother  and  sister 
to  wear;  so  I  asked  a  few  more  silly  questions  and 
found  out  the  mystery.  It  seemed  the  secret  of  a 
beagle's  existence  was  rabbits.  Yes,  sir;  they  was 
mad  about  rabbits  and  went  in  keenly  for  'em.  Only 
they  wouldn't  notice  one,  I  gathered,  if  the  parties 
that  followed  'em  wasn't  dressed  proper  for  it. 

"Then  we  went  in  where  we  could  hear  each  other 
without  screaming,  and  the  lady  tells  me  more  about 
it,  and  how  beagles  is  her  last  hope  of  her  chits  ever 
amounting  to  anything  in  the  great  world  of  sport. 
If  they  don't  go  in  keenly  for  beagles  she'll  just  have 
to  give  up  and  let  Nature  take  its  course  with  the 
poor  things.  And  she  said  these  was  A-Number- 
One  beagles,  being  sure  to  get  a  rabbit  if  one  was  in 
the  country.  She'd  just  had  'em  at  a  big  fashion 
able  country  resort  down  South,  some  place  where 
the  sport  attracted  much  notice  from  the  simple- 
minded  peasantry,  and  it  hadn't  been  a  good  country 
for  rabbits;  so  the  beagles  had  trooped  into  a  back 
yard  and  destroyed  a  Belgian  hare  that  had  belonged 
to  a  little  boy,  whose  father  come  out  and  swore  at 
the  costumed  hunters  in  a  very  common  manner,  and 
offered  to  lick  any  three  of  'em  at  once. 

"And  in  hurrying  acrost  a  field  to  get  away  from 


298  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

this  rowdy,  that  seemed  liable  to  forget  himself  and 
do  something  they'd  all  regret  later,  they  was  put  up 
a  tree  by  a  bull  that  was  sensitive  about  costumes, 
and  had  to  stay  there  two  hours,  with  the  bull  trying 
to  grub  up  the  tree,  and  would  of  done  so  if  his  owner 
hadn't  come  along  and  rescued  'em. 

"She  made  it  sound  like  an  exciting  sport,  all  right, 
yet  nothing  I  thought  I'd  ever  go  in  keenly  for.  It 
didn't  seem  like  anything  I'd  get  up  in  the  night  to 
indulge  myself  in.  And  I  agreed  with  her  that  if 
her  chits  found  beagling  too  adventurous,  then  all 
hope  was  gone  and  she  might  as  well  let  'em  die 
peacefully  in  their  beds. 

"Two  days  later  the  costumes  come  along  and  I 
was  kindly  sent  word  to  show  up  the  next  morning 
if  I  wanted  to  see  some  ripping  sport  that  I'd  be 
quite  mad  about  and  go  in  for  keenly,  and  all  that 
sort  of  thing,  by  Jove!  Of  course  I  go  over,  on  ac 
count  of  this  dame's  atrocities  never  yet  having 
failed  to  interest  me,  and  I  didn't  think  she'd  fall 
down  now.  I  felt  strangely  out  of  it,  though,  when 
I  seen  the  costumes.  Ma  and  sister  had,  from  the 
top  down,  black  velvet  jockey  caps;  green  velvet 
coats  with  gold  buttons;  white  pique  skirts,  coming 
to  the  knee;  black  silk  stockings;  and  neat  black  shoes 
with  white  spats.  Brother  had  been  abused  the 
same,  barring  the  white  skirt,  which  left  him  looking 
like  something  out  of  a  collection  called  The  Dolls  of 
All  Nations. 

"I  saw  right  off  that  all  these  clothes  must  be 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  299 

necessary — they  looked  so  careful  and  expensive. 
Yes,  sir;  that  lady  would  no  more  of  went  out  bea 
gling  without  being  draped  for  it  than  she'd  of  gone 
steer  hunting  without  a  vanity -box  lashed  to  her  saddle 
horn. 

"I  sort  of  hung  back  with  the  awe-stricken  help 
when  the  start  was  made.  They  was  all  out  in  front 
except  the  butler,  who  lurked  in  the  entry  looking 
like  he'd  passed  a  night  of  grief  at  the  new-made  grave 
of  his  mother. 

"The  beagles  surged  all  over  the  place  the  minute 
they  was  let  loose,  and  then  made  for  down  in  the 
willows  below  the  house.  And,  sure  enough,  they 
started  a  cottontail  down  there  and  went  in  for  him 
keenly,  followed  by  ma  and  brother  and  sister. 
Brother  started  to  yell  'Yoicks!  Yoicks!'  But  ma 
shut  him  off  with  a  good  deal  of  severity  that  caused 
him  to  blush  at  his  words.  It  seems  Yoicks  is  a  cry 
you  give  at  some  other  critical  juncture  in  life. 
When  beagles  start  you  must  yell  'Gone  away!'  in 
a  clear,  ringing  voice.  Brother  meant  well,  but  didn't 
know. 

"Anyhow,  they  followed  those  pups,  and  I  trailed 
along  at  a  decent  distance  on  my  horse;  and  pretty 
soon  they  got  the  rabbit  which  had  been  fool  enough 
to  come  round  in  a  wide  circle  back  to  where  it 
started  from.  Say!  It  was  mere  child's  play  for 
that  plucky  little  band  of  nine  dogs  to  clean  up  that 
rabbit.  They  never  had  a  minute's  fear  of  it  and  the 
rabbit  didn't  have  the  least  chance  of  winning  the 


300          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

fight,  not  at  any  stage.  Yes,  sir!  any  time  you  see 
nine  beagles  setting  on  a  tuckered  rabbit — I  don't 
care  how  wild  he  is — you'll  know  how  to  put  your 
money  down. 

"I  never  did  see  a  rabbit  put  up  a  worse  fight  than 
that  one  did.  I  rode  up  to  its  fragments,  and  the 
old  lady  was  saying  how  ripping  it  was  and  calling 
sister  a  mollycoddle,  because  here  was  sister  crying 
like  a  baby  over  the  rabbit's  fate — a  rabbit  she'd 
never  set  eyes  on  before  in  her  life.  Brother  didn't 
look  like  he  had  gone  in  keenly  for  the  sport,  either. 
He  was  kind  of  green  and  yellow,  like  one  of  these 
parties  on  shipboard  about  the  time  he's  saying  he 
don't  feel  the  boat's  motion  the  least  bit;  and,  any 
way,  he's  got  a  sure-fire  remedy  for  it  if  anything  does 
happen.  I  just  kind  of  stood  around,  neutral  and 
revolted. 

"Pretty  soon  the  pack  beagles  off  again  with  glad 
cries;  and  this  time,  up  on  the  hillside,  what  do  they 
start  but  a  little  spike  buck  that  has  been  down  to  a 
salt  lick  on  the  creek  flat!  They  wasn't  any  more 
afraid  of  him  than  they  had  been  of  the  rabbit  and 
started  to  chase  him  out  of  the  country.  Of  course 
they  didn't  do  well  after  they  got  him  interested. 
The  last  I  saw  of  the  race  he  was  making  'enl  look 
like  they  was  in  reverse  gear  and  backing  up  full 
speed.  Anyway,  that  seemed  to  end  the  sport  for 
the  day,  because  the  dogs  and  the  buck  must  of  been 
over  near  the  county  line  in  ten  minutes.  The  old 
lady  was  mad  and  blamed  it  on  the  valet,  who  come 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          301 

up  and  had  to  take  as  sweet  a  roasting  as  you  ever 
heard  a  man  get  from  a  lady  word  painter.  It  seems 
he'd  ought  to  have  taught  'em  to  ignore  deer. 

"Then  I  lied  like  a  lady  and  said  it  was  a  ripping 
sport  that  I  would  sure  go  in  keenly  for  if  I  had  time; 
and  we  all  went  back  to  the  house  and  sat  down  to 
what  they  called  a  hunt  breakfast.  Ma  said  at  last 
her  chits  could  hold  up  their  heads  in  the  world  of 
sport  and  not  be  a  reproach  to  her  training.  The 
chits  looked  very  thoughtful,  indeed.  Sister  still 
had  red  eyes  and  couldn't  eat  a  mouthful  of  hunt 
breakfast,  and  brother  just  toyed  with  little  dabs 
of  it. 

"Next  day  I  learned  the  pack  didn't  get  back  till 
late  that  evening,  straggling  in  one  by  one,  and  the 
valet  having  to  go  out  and  look  for  the  last  two  with 
a  lantern.  Also,  these  last  two  had  been  treated 
brutally  by  some  denizen  of  the  wild  wood.  Rex  II 
had  darn  near  lost  his  eyesight  and  Lady  Blessing- 
ton  was  clawed  something  scandalous.  Brother 
said  mebbe  a  rabbit  mad  with  hydrophobia  had  turned 
on  'em.  He  said  it  in  hopeful  tones,  and  sister 
cheered  right  up  and  said  if  these  two  had  it  they 
would  give  it  to  the  rest  of  the  pack,  and  shouldn't 
they  all  be  shot  at  once? 

"Mother  said  what  jolly  nonsense;  that  they'd 
merely  been  scratched  by  thorns.  I  thought,  my 
self,  that  mebbe  they'd  gone  out  of  their  class  and 
tackled  a  jack  rabbit;  but  I  didn't  say  it,  seeing  that 
the  owner  was  sensitive.  Afterward  she  showed  me 


302  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

a  lot  of  silver  things  her  pets  had  won — eyecups  and 
custard  dishes,  and  coffee  urns  and  things,  about 
a  dozen,  with  their  names  engraved  on  'em.  She 
said  it  was  very  annoying  to  have  'em  take  after 
deer  that  way.  What  she  wanted  'em  to  do  was  to 
butcher  rabbits  where  parties  in  the  right  garments 
could  stand  and  look  on. 

"Next  day  they  tried  again;  and  one  fool  rabbit 
was  soon  gone  in  for  keenly  to  the  renewed  sound  of 
sister's  bitter  sobs,  and  brother  looking  like  he'd 
been  in  jail  two  years — no  colour  left  at  all  in  his  face. 
But  pretty  soon  the  pack  took  up  the  scent  of  a  deer 
again,  and  that  was  the  end  of  another  day's  sport. 
Brother  and  sister  looked  glad  and  resumed  their 
peaceful  sports.  He  hunted  butterflies  with  a  net, 
and  she  set  down  and  looked  at  birds  through  an 
opera  glass  and  wrote  down  things  about  their  per 
sonal  appearance  in  a  notebook.  The  old  lady 
changed  to  her  cowboy  suit  and  went  out  and  roped 
three  steers — just  to  work  her  mad  off,  I  guess. 

"Well,  this  time  the  beagles  not  only  limped  in 
at  a  shocking  hour  of  the  night  but  three  of  the 
others  had  had  their  beauty  marred  by  a  demon 
rabbit  or  something.  They  had  been  licked  very 
thoroughly,  indeed;  and  the  old  lady  now  said  it 
must  be  a  grizzly  bear,  and  brother  and  sister  beamed 
on  her  and  said:  'What  a  shame!'  And  would  they 
hunt  again  next  day?  For  the  first  time  they  seemed 
quite  mad  about  the  sport.  Mother  said  they  better 
wait  till  she  went  out  and  shot  the  grizzly,  but  I  told 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          303 

her  we  hadn't  had  any  grizzlies  round  here  for  years; 
so  she  said,  all  right,  they  could  lick  anything  less 
than  a  grizzly.  And  they  beagled  again  next  day, 
with  terrible  and  inspiring  results,  not  only  to  Rex  II 
and  Lady  Blessington  again,  but  to  two  of  the  others 
that  hadn't  been  touched  before. 

"This  left  only  two  of  the  pack  that  hadn't  been 
horribly  abused  by  some  unknown  varmint;  so  a 
halt  had  to  be  called  for  three  days  while  Red  Cross 
work  was  done.  Brother  and  sister  tried  to  look 
regretful  and  complained  about  this  break  in  the 
ripping  sport;  but  their  manner  was  artificial.  They 
spent  the  time  riding  peacefully  round  up  in  the 
canon,  pretending  to  look  for  the  wild  creature  that 
had  chewed  their  little  pets.  They  come  back  one 
day  and  cheered  their  mother  a  whole  lot  by  telling 
her  the  pack  had  been  over  the  pass  as  far  as  the  house 
of  a  worthy  rancher,  Mr.  Floud  by  name.  They 
said  Mr.  Floud  didn't  believe  there  was  any  bears 
round,  and  further  said  he  greatly  admired  the 
beagles,  even  though  at  first  they  seriously  annoyed 
his  pet  kitten. 

"The  old  lady  said  this  was  ripping  of  Mr.  Floud, 
to  take  it  in  such  a  sporting  way,  because  many 
people  in  the  past  had  tried  to  make  all  sorts  of  nasty 
rows  when  her  pets  had  happened  to  kill  their  kit 
tens.  Brother  said,  yes;  Mr.  Floud  took  the  whole 
thing  in  a  true  sporting  way,  and  he  hoped  the  pack 
would  soon  be  well  enough  to  hunt  again.  Right 
then  I  detected  falsity  in  his  manner;  I  couldn't 


304  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

make  out  what  it  was,  but  I  knew  he  was  putting 
something  over  on  mother. 

"Two  days  later  the  dogs  was  fit  again,  and  an 
other  gay  hunt  was  had,  with  a  rabbit  to  the  good  in 
the  first  twenty  minutes,  and  then  the  usual  break, 
when  they  struck  a  deer  scent.  Brother  said  he'd 
follow  on  his  horse  this  time  and  try  to  get  whatever 
was  bothering  'em.  He  didn't.  He  said  he  lost 
'em.  They  crawled  back  at  night,  well  chewed;  and 
mother  was  now  frantic. 

"There  had  to  be  another  three  days  in  bed  for 
the  cunning  little  murderers,  after  which  brother 
and  sister  both  went  out  with  'em  on  horseback,  with 
the  same  mysterious  results — except  that  Rex  II 
didn't  get  in  till  next  day  and  looked  like  he'd  come 
through  a  feed  chopper.  For  the  next  hunt,  four 
days  after  that,  the  old  lady  went,  too,  all  of  'em  on 
horseback;  but  the  same  slinking  marauder  got  at 
the  pack  before  they  could  come  up  with  it,  and  two 
of  'em  had  to  be  brought  back  in  arms.  They 
all  stopped  here  on  the  way  home  to  tell  about  the 
mystery.  Brother  and  sister  was  very  cheerful  and 
mad  about  the  sport,  but  their  manner  was  falser 
than  ever.  Mother  says  the  pack  is  being  ruined,  and 
she  wouldn't  continue  the  sport,  except  it  has  roused 
the  first  gleam  of  interest  her  chits  has  ever  showed 
in  anything  worth  while.  I  caught  the  chits  looking 
at  each  other  in  a  guilty  manner  when  she  says  this, 
and  my  curiosity  wakes  up.  I  says  next  time  they 
go  out  I  will  be  pleased  to  go  with  'em;  and  the  old 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  305 

lady  thanks  me  and  says  mebbe  I  can  solve  this 
reprehensible  mystery. 

"  In  another  three  days  they  come  by  for  me.  The 
beagles  was  looking  an  awful  lot  different  from  what 
I  had  first  seen  'em.  They  was  not  only  beautifully 
scarred  but  they  acted  kind  of  timid  and  reproachful, 
and  their  yapping  had  a  note  of  caution  in  it  that  I 
hadn't  noticed  before.  So  I  got  on  my  pony  and 
went  along  to  help  probe  the  crime.  We  worked 
up  the  canon  trail  and  over  the  pass,  with  the  pack 
staying  meekly  behind  most  of  the  time.  Just  the 
other  side  of  the  pass  they  actually  got  a  rabbit, 
though  not  working  with  their  old-time  recklessness, 
I  thought.  Of  course  we  had  to  stop  and  watch 
this.  Brother  looked  the  other  way  and  sister  just 
set  there  biting  her  lips,  with  an  evil  gleam  in  her 
pale-blue  eyes.  Not  a  beagle  in  the  pack  would  have 
trusted  himself  alone  with  her  at  that  minute  if  he'd 
known  his  business. 

"Then  we  rode  on  down  toward  Cousin  Egbert's 
shack,  with  nothing  further  happening  and  the  pups 
staying  back  in  a  highly  conservative  manner. 
Brother  says  that  yonder  is  the  Mr.  Floud's  place 
he  had  spoken  of,  and  ma  wants  to  know  if  he,  too, 
goes  in  for  ranching,  and  I  says  yes,  he's  awfully  keen 
about  it;  so  she  says  we'll  ride  over  and  chat  with 
him  and  perhaps  he  can  suggest  some  solution  of 
the  mystery  in  hand.  I  said  all  right,  and  we  ride  up. 

"Cousin  Egbert  is  tipped  back  in  a  chair  outside 
the  door,  reading  a  Sunday  paper.  Whenever  he 


306  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

gets  one  up  here  he  always  reads  it  clean  through, 
from  murders  to  want  ads.  And  he'd  got  into  this 
about  as  far  as  the  beauty  hints  and  secrets  of  the 
toilet.  Well,  he  was  very  polite  and  awkward,  and 
asked  us  into  his  dinky  little  shack;  and  the  old  lady 
says  she  hears  he  is  quite  mad  about  ranching,  and 
he  says,  Oh,  yes — only  it  don't  help  matters  any  to 
get  mad;  and  he  finds  a  chair  for  her,  and  the  rest 
of  us  set  on  stools  and  the  bed;  and  just  then  she 
notices  that  the  beagle  pack  has  halted  about  thirty 
feet  from  the  door,  and  some  of  'em  is  milling  and 
acting  like  they  think  of  starting  for  home  at  once. 

"So  out  she  goes  and  orders  the  little  pets  up. 
They  didn't  want  to  come  one  bit;  it  seemed  like  they 
was  afraid  of  something,  but  they  was  well  disciplined 
and  they  finally  crawled  forward,  looking  like  they 
didn't  know  what  minute  something  cruel  might 
happen. 

"The  old  lady  petted  'em  and  made  'em  lie  down, 
and  asked  Cousin  Egbert  if  he'd  ever  seen  better 
ones,  or  even  as  good;  and  he  said  No,  ma'am;  they 
was  sure  fine  beetles.  Then  she  begun  to  tell  him 
about  some  wild  animal  that  had  been  attacking  'em, 
a  grizzly,  or  mebbe  a  mountain  lion,  with  cubs;  and 
he  is  saying  in  a  very  false  manner  that  he  can't 
think  what  would  want  to  harm  such  playful  little 
pets,  and  so  on.  All  this  time  the  pets  is  in  fine 
attitudes  of  watchful  waiting,  and  I'm  just  beginning 
to  suspect  a  certain  possibility  when  it  actually  hap 
pens. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  307 

"There  was  an  open  window  high  up  in  the  log 
wall  acrost  from  the  door,  and  old  Kate  jumps  up 
onto  the  sill  from  the  outside.  He  was  one  fierce 
object,  let  me  tell  you;  weighing  about  thirty  pounds, 
all  muscle,  with  one  ear  gone,  and  an  eye  missing 
that  a  porcupine  quill  got  into,  and  a  lot  of  fresh 
new  battle  scars.  We  all  got  a  good  look  at  him 
while  he  crouched  there  for  a  second,  purring  like  a 
twelve-cylinder  car  and  twitching  his  whiskers  at  us 
in  a  lazy  way,  like  he  wanted  to  have  folks  make  a 
fuss  over  him.  And  then,  all  at  once,  catching  sight 
of  the  dogs,  he  changed  to  a  demon;  his  back  up,  his 
whiskers  in  a  stiff  tremble,  and  his  half  of  a  tail  grown 
double  in  girth. 

"I  looked  quick  to  the  dogs,  and  they  was  froze 
stiff  with  horror  for  at  least  another  second.  Then 
they  made  one  scramble  for  the  open  door,  and  Kate 
made  a  beautiful  spring  for  the  bunch,  landing  on 
the  back  of  the  last  one  with  a  yell  of  triumph. 
Mother  shrieked,  too,  and  we  all  rushed  to  the  door 
to  see  one  of  the  prettiest  chases  you'd  want  to  look 
at,  with  old  Kate  handing  out  the  side  wipes  every 
time  he  could  get  near  one  of  the  dogs.  They  fled 
down  over  the  creek  bank  and  a  minute  later  we 
could  see  the  pack  legging  it  up  the  other  side  to  beat 
the  cars,  losing  Kate — I  guess  because  he  didn't 
like  to  get  his  hide  wet. 

"When  the  first  shock  of  this  wore  off,  here  was 
silly  old  Egbert,  in  a  weak  voice,  calling:  *  Kitty, 
Htty,  Kitty!  Here,  Kitty!  Here,  Kitty!'  Then 


308  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

we  notice  brother  and  sister.  Brother  is  waving 
his  hat  in  the  air  and  yelling  'Yoicks!'  and  'Gone 
away!'  and  'Fair  sport,  by  Jove!' — just  like  some 
crazy  man;  and  sister,  with  her  chest  going  up  and 
down,  is  clapping  her  hands  and  yelling  'Goody! 
Goody!  Goody!'  and  squealing  with  helpless 
laughter.  Mother  just  stood  gazing  at  'em  in  horri 
ble  silence.  Pretty  soon  they  felt  it  and  stopped, 
looking  like  a  couple  of  kids  that  know  it's  spanking 
time. 

"'So!'  says  mother.  That's  all  she  said — just, 
'So!' 

"But  she  stuffed  the  simple  word  with  eloquence; 
she  left  it  pregnant  with  meaning,  as  they  say. 
Then  she  stalked  loftily  out  and  got  on  her  horse, 
brother  and  sister  slinking  after  her.  I  guess  I 
slunk,  too,  though  it  was  none  of  my  doings.  Cousin 
Egbert  kind  of  sidled  along,  mumbling  about  Kitty: 

"  'Kitty  was  quite  frightened  of  the  pets  first  time 
he  seen  'em;  but  someway  to-day  it  seemed  like  he 
had  lost  much  of  his  fear — seemed  more  like  he  had 
wanted  to  play  with  'em,  or  something.' 

"Nobody  listened  to  the  doddering  old  wretch, 
but  I  caught  brother  winking  at  him  behind  mother's 
back.  Then  we  all  rode  off  in  lofty  silence,  headed 
by  mother,  who  never  once  looked  back  to  her  late 
host,  even  if  he  was  mad  about  ranching.  We  got 
up  over  the  pass  and  the  pack  of  ruined  beagles 
begun  to  straggle  out  of  the  underbrush.  A  good 
big  buck  rabbit  with  any  nerve  could  have  put  'em 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  309 

all  on  the  run  again.  You  could  tell  that.  They 
slunk  along  at  the  tail  of  the  parade.  I  dropped  out 
informally  when  it  passed  the  place  here.  It  seemed 
like  something  might  happen  where  they'd  want  only 
near  members  of  the  family  present. 

"I  don't  hear  anything  from  Broadmoor  next  day; 
so  the  morning  after  that  I  ride  over  to  Cousin  Eg 
bert's  to  see  if  I  couldn't  get  a  better  line  on  the  recent 
tragedy.  He  was  still  on  his  Sunday  paper,  having 
finished  an  article  telling  that  man  had  once  been 
scaly,  like  a  fish;  and  was  just  beginning  the  fashion 
notes,  with  pictures  showing  that  the  smart  frock  was 
now  patterned  like  an  awning.  Old  Kate  was  lying 
on  a  bench  in  the  sun,  trying  to  lick  a  new  puncture 
he'd  got  in  his  chest. 

"I  started  right  in  on  the  old  reprobate.  I  said 
it  was  a  pretty  how-de-do  if  a  distinguished  lady 
amateur,  trying  to  raise  ranching  to  the  dignity  of  a 
sport,  couldn't  turn  loose  a  few  prize  beagles  without 
having  'em  taken  for  a  hunt  breakfast  by  a  nefarious 
beast  that  ought  to  be  in  a  stout  cage  in  a  circus  this 
minute!  I  thought,  of  course,  this  would  insult  him; 
but  he  sunned  right  up  and  admitted  that  Kate  was 
about  half  to  three-quarters  bobcat;  and  wasn't  he  a 
fine  specimen?  And  if  he  could  only  get  about  eight 
more  as  good  he'd  have  a  pack  of  beagle-cats  that 
would  be  the  envy  of  the  whole  sporting  world. 

"'It  ain't  done!'  I  remarked,  aiming  to  crush  him. 

"  *  It  is,  too ! '  Egbert  says.  '  I  did  it  myself.  Look 
what  I  already  done,  just  with  Kitty  alone!' 


310          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"'How'd  it  start?'  I  asked  him. 

"'Easy!1  says  he.  'They  took  Kate  for  a  rabbit 
and  Kate  took  them  for  rabbits.  It  was  a  mutual 
error.  They  found  out  theirs  right  soon;  but  I  bet 
Kate  ain't  found  out  his,  even  to  this  day.  I  bet  he 
thinks  they're  just  a  new  kind  of  rabbit  that's  been 
started.  The  first  day  they  broke  in  here  he  was 
loafin'  round  out  in  front,  and  naturally  he  started  for 
'em,  though  probably  surprised  to  see  rabbits  travel 
ling  in  a  bunch.  Also,  they  see  Kate  and  start  for 
him,  which  must  of  startled  him  good  and  plenty. 
He'd  never  had  rabbits  make  for  him  before.  He 
pulled  up  so  quick  he  skidded.  I  could  see  his  mind 
working.  Don't  tell  me  that  cat  ain't  got  brains  like 
a  human!  He  was  saying  to  himself:  "Is  this  here  a 
new  kind  of  rabbits,  or  is  it  a  joke — or  what?  Mebbe 
I  better  not  try  anything  rash  till  I  find  out." 

"'They  was  still  coming  for  him  acrost  the  flat, 
with  their  tongues  out;  so  he  soopled  himself  up  a  bit 
with  a  few  jumps  and  made  for  that  there  big  down 
spruce.  He  lands  on  the  trunk  and  runs  along  it  to 
where  the  top  begins.  He  has  it  all  worked  out. 
He's  saying:  "If  this  here  is  a  joke,  all  right;  but  if  it 
ain't  a  joke  I  better  have  some  place  back  of  me  for  a 
kind  of  refuge." 

"'So  up  come  these  strange  rabbits  and  started  to 
jump  for  him  on  the  trunk  of  the  spruce;  but  it's 
pretty  high  and  they  can't  quite  make  it.  And  in  a 
minute  they  sort  of  suspicion  something  on  their  part, 
because  Kate  has  rared  his  back  and  is  giving  'em  a 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          311 

line  of  abuse  they  never  heard  from  any  rabbit  yet. 
Awful  wicked  it  was,  and  they  sure  got  puzzled.  I 
could  hear  one  of  'em  saying:  "Aw,  come  on!  That 
ain't  no  regular  rabbit;  he  don't  look  like  a  rabbit, 
and  he  don't  talk  like  a  rabbit,  and  he  don't  act  like  a 
rabbit!"  Then  another  would  say:  "What  of  it? 
What  do  we  care  if  he's  a  regular  rabbit  or  not? 
Let's  get  him,  anyway,  and  take  him  apart!" 

"'So  they  all  begin  to  jump  again  and  can't  quite 
make  it  till  their  leader  says  he'll  show  'em  a  real 
jump.  He  backs  off  a  little  to  get  a  run  and  lands 
right  on  the  log.  Then  he  wished  he  hadn't.  Old 
Kate  worked  so  quick  I  couldn't  hardly  follow  it. 
In  about  three  seconds  this  leader  lands  on  his  back 
down  in  the  bunch,  squealing  like  one  of  these  Italian 
sopranos  when  the  flute  follows  her  up.  He  crawls 
off  on  his  stomach,  still  howling,  and  I  see  he's  had  a 
couple  of  wipes  over  the  eye,  and  one  of  his  ears  is 
shredded. 

"A  couple  of  the  others  come  over  to  ask  him  how 
it  happened,  and  what  he  quit  for,  and  did  his  foot 
slip;  and  he  says:  "Mark  my  words,  gentlemen;  we 
got  our  work  cut  out  for  us  here.  That  animal  is 
acting  less  and  less  Eke  a  rabbit  every  minute.  He's 
more  turbulent  and  he's  got  spurs  on."  He  goes  on 
talking  this  way  while  the  others  bark  at  Kate,  and 
Kate  dares  any  one  of  'em  to  come  on  up  there  and 
have  it  out,  man  to  man.  Finally  another  lands  on 
the  tree  trunk  and  gets  what  the  first  one  got.  I 
could  see  it  this  time.  Kate  done  some  dandy  short- 


312  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

arm  work  in  the  clinches  and  hurled  him  off  on  his 
back  like  the  other  one;  then  he  stands  there  sharpen 
ing  his  claws  on  the  bark  and  grinning  in  a  masterful 
way.  He  was  saying:  "You  will,  will  you?" 

"'Then  one  of  these  beetles  must  of  said,  "Come 
on,  boys — all  together  now!"  for  four  of  'em  landed 
up  on  the  trunk  all  to  once.  And  Kate  wasn't  there. 
He'd  had  the  top  of  this  fallen  tree  at  his  back,  and 
he  kites  up  a  limb  about  ten  feet  above  then*  heads 
and  stretches  out  for  a  rest,  cool  as  anything,  licking 
his  paws  and  purring  like  he  enjoyed  the  beautiful 
summer  day,  and  wasn't  everything  calm  and  lovely? 
It  was  awful  insulting  the  way  he  looked  down  on 
'em,  with  his  eyes  half  shut.  And  you  never  seen 
beetles  so  astonished  in  your  life.  They  just  couldn't 
believe  their  eyes,  seeing  a  rabbit  act  that  way!  The 
leader  limps  over  and  says:  "There!  What  did  I 
tell  you,  smarties?  I  guess  next  time  you'll  take  my 
word  for  it.  I  guess  you  can  see  plain  enough  now  he 
ain't  no  rabbit,  the  way  he  skinned  up  that  tree." 

"'They  calm  down  a  mite  at  this,  and  one  or  two 
says  they  thought  he  was  right  from  the  first;  and 
some  others  says:  "Well,  it  wouldn't  make  no  differ 
ence  what  he  was,  rabbit  or  no  rabbit,  if  he'd  just 
come  down  and  meet  the  bunch  of  us  fair  and  square; 
but  the  dirty  coward  is  afraid  to  fight  us,  except  one 
at  a  time."  The  leader  is  very  firm,  though.  He 
tells  'em  that  if  this  here  object  ain't  a  rabbit  they  got 
no  right  to  molest  him,  and  if  he  is  a  rabbit  he's  gone 
crazy,  and  wouldn't  be  good  to  eat,  anyway;  so  they 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          313 

better  go  find  one  that  act?  sensible.  And  he  gets 
'em  away,  all  talking  about  it  excitedly. 

"'Well,  sir,  you  wouldn't  believe  how  tickled  Kate 
was  all  that  day.  It  was  like  he'd  found  a  new  in 
terest  in  life.  And  next  time  these  beetles  come  up 
they  pull  off  another  grand  scrap.  Kate  laid  for  'em 
just  this  side  of  the  creek  and  let  'em  chase  him  back  to 
his  tree.  He  skun  up  three  others  that  day,  still  pur- 
suin'  his  cowardly  tactics  of  fighting  'em  one  at  a 
time,  and  retirin'  to  his  perch  when  three  or  four 
would  come  at  once.  Also,  when  they  give  him  up 
again  and  started  off  he  come  down  and  chased  'em  to 
the  creek  bank,  like  you  seen  the  other  day,  telling 
'em  to  be  sure  and  not  forget  the  number,  because  he 
ain't  had  so  much  fun  since  he  met  up  with  a  wood- 
chuck.  The  next  time  they  showed  up  he'd  got  so 
contemptuous  of  'em  that  he'd  leap  down  and  engage 
one  that  had  got  separated  from  the  pack.  He  had 
two  of  'em  darn'  near  out  before  they  was  rescued  by 
their  friends. 

"'Then,  a  few  days  later,  along  comes  the  pack 
again — only  this  time  they're  being  herded  by  the 
lad  with  the  ginger-coloured  whiskers.  He  gets  off 
his  horse  and  says  how  do  I  do,  and  what  lovely 
weather,  and  how  bracing  the  air  is;  and  I  says  what 
pretty  beetles  he  has;  and  he  says  it's  ripping  sport; 
and  I  says,  yes;  Kate  has  ripped  up  a  number  of  'em, 
but  I  hope  he  don't  blame  me  none,  because  my  Kitty 
has  to  defend  himself.  Say,  this  guy  brightened  up 
and  like  to  took  me  off  my  feet!  He  grabs  both  my 


314  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

hands  and  shakes  'em  warmly  for  a  long  time  and  says 
do  I  think  my  cat  can  put  the  whole  bunch  on  the 
blink? — or  words  to  that  effect.  And  I  says  it's  the 
surest  thing  in  the  world;  but  why?  And  he  says, 
then  the  sooner  the  better,  because  it's  a  barbarous 
sport  and  every  last  beetle  ought  to  be  thoroughly 
killed;  and  when  they  are,  in  case  his  mother  don't 
find  out  the  crooked  work,  mebbe  he'll  be  let  to  raise 
orchids  or  do  something  useful  in  the  world,  instead 
of  frittering  his  life  away  in  the  vain  pursuit  of  pleas 
ure. 

" '  Oh,  he  was  the  chatty  lad,  all  right !  And  I  felt 
kind  of  sorry  for  him;  so  I  says  Kate  would  dearly 
love  to  wipe  these  beetles  out  one  by  one;  and  he  says : 
"  Capital,  by  Jove ! "  And  I  call  Kitty  and  we  pull  off 
another  nice  little  scrap  on  the  fallen  tree,  though  it's 
hard  to  make  the  beetles  take  much  interest  in  it 
now,  except  in  the  way  of  self-defense.  Even  at  that, 
they're  kept  plenty  occupied. 

"'Say,  this  guy  is  the  happiest  you  ever  see  one 
when  Kate  has  about  four  more  of  'em  licked  to  a 
standstill  in  jigtime.  He  says  he  has  one  more  favour 
to  ask  of  me :  Will  I  allow  his  sister  to  come  up  some 
day  and  see  the  lovely  carnage?  And  I  says,  Sure! 
Kate  will  be  glad  to  oblige  any  time.  He  says  he'll 
fetch  her  up  the  first  time  the  pack  is  able  to  get  out 
again,  and  he  keeps  on  chattering  like  a  child  that's 
found  a  new  play-pretty. 

"  *I  can't  hardly  get  him  off  the  place,  he's  so  great- 
ful  to  me.  He  tells  me  his  biography  and  about  how 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          315 

this  here  blond  guy  has  been  roughing  him  all  over 
Europe  and  Asia,  and  how  it  had  got  to  stop  right 
here,  because  a  man  has  a  right  to  live  his  own  life, 
after  all;  and  then  he  branches  off  in  a  nutty  way  to 
tell  me  that  he  always  takes  a  cold  shower  every 
morning,  winter  and  summer,  and  he  never  could  read 
a  line  of  Sir  Walter  Scott,  and  why  don't  some  genius 
invent  a  fountain  pen  that  will  work  at  all  times?  and 
so  on,  till  it  sounded  delirious.  But  he  left  at  last. 

"And  we  had  some  good  ripping  sport  when 
him  and  sister  come  up.  I  never  seen  such  a  blood 
thirsty  female.  She'd  nearly  laugh  her  head  off  when 
Kitty  was  gouging  the  eye  out  of  one  of  these  cunning 
little  scamps.  She  said  if  I'd  ever  seen  the  nasty 
curs  pile  on  to  one  poor  defenseless  little  bunny  I'd 
understand  why  she  was  so  keen  about  my  beetle- 
cat.  That's  what  she  called  Kate. 

"'Kate,  he  got  kind  of  bored  with  the  whole  busi 
ness  after  that.  He  hadn't  actually  eat  one  yet,  and 
mebbe  that  was  all  that  kept  him  going — wanting  to 
see  if  they'd  taste  any  better  than  regular  rabbits. 
But  you  bet  they  knew  now  that  Kate  wasn't  any 
kind  of  a  rabbit.  They  didn't  have  any  more  argu 
ments  on  that  point — they  knew  darn'  well  he  didn't 
have  a  drop  of  rabbit  blood  in  his  veins.  Oh,  he's 
some  beetle-cat,  all  right!' 

"That's  Cousin  Egbert  for  you!  Can  you  beat 
him — changing  round  and  being  proud  of  this  mixed 
marriage  that  he  had  formerly  held  to  be  a  scandal! 

"Well,  I  go  back  home,  and  here  is  mother  waiting 


316          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

for  me.  And  she's  a  changed  woman.  She's  actually 
give  up  trying  to  make  anything  out  of  her  chits, 
because  after  considerable  browbeating  and  third- 
degree  stuff,  they've  come  through  with  the  whole 
evil  conspiracy — how  they'd  got  her  prize-winning 
beagles  licked  by  a  common  cat  that  wouldn't  be  let 
into  any  bench  show  on  earth !  Her  spirit  was  broke. 

"'My  poor  son/  she  says,  'I  shall  allow  to  go  his 
silly  way  after  this  outrageous  bit  of  double-dealing. 
I  think  it  useless  to  strive  further  with  him.  He  has 
not  only  confessed  all  the  foul  details,  but  he  came 
brazenly  out  with  the  assertion  that  a  man  has  a  right 
to  lead  his  own  life — and  he  barely  thirty!' 

"  She  goes  on  to  say  that  it's  this  terrible  twentieth- 
century  modernism  that  has  infected  him.  She  says 
that,  first  woman  sets  up  a  claim  to  live  her  own  life, 
and  now  men  are  claiming  the  same  right,  even  one 
as  carefully  raised  and  guarded  as  her  boy  has  been; 
and  what  are  we  coming  to?  But,  anyway,  she  did 
her  best  for  him. 

"  Pretty  soon  Broadmoor  was  closed  like  you  seen 
it  to-day.  Sister  is  now  back  in  Boston,  keeping  tabs 
on  orchestras  and  attending  lectures  on  the  higher 
birds;  and  brother  at  last  has  his  orchid  ranch  some 
where  down  in  California.  He's  got  one  pet  orchid 
that  I  heard  cost  twelve  thousand  dollars — I  don't 
know  why.  But  he's  very  happy  living  his  own  life. 
The  last  I  heard  of  mother  she  was  exploring  the 
headwaters  of  the  Amazon  River,  hunting  crocodiles 
and  jaguars  and  natives,  and  so  on. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  317 

"She  was  a  good  old  sport,  though.  She  showed 
that  by  the  way  she  simmered  down  about  Cousin 
Egbert's  cat  before  she  left.  At  first,  she  wanted  to 
lay  for  it  and  put  a  bullet  through  its  cowardly 
heart.  Then  she  must  of  seen  the  laugh  was  on  her, 
all  right;  for  what  did  she  do?  Why,  the  last  thing 
she  done  was  to  box  up  all  these  silver  cups  her  beagles 
had  won  and  send  'em  over  to  Kate,  in  care  of  his 
owner — all  the  eye-cups  and  custard  bowls,  and  so  on. 
Cousin  Egbert  shows  'em  off  to  every  one. 

"  'Just  a  few  cups  that  Kate  won,'  he'll  say.  'I 
want  to  tell  you  he's  some  beetle-cat!  Look  what 
he's  come  up  to — and  out  of  nothing,  you  might 
say!'  " 


vm 

PETE'S  B'OTHER-IN-LAW 

ON  THE  Arrowhead  Ranch  it  was  noon  by  the 
bell  that  Lew  Wee  loves  to  clang.  It  may 
have  been  half  an  hour  earlier  or  later  on 
other  ranches,  for  Lew  Wee  is  no  petty  precisian. 
Ma  Pettengill  had  ridden  off  at  dawn;  and,  rather 
than  eat  luncheon  in  solitary  state,  I  joined  her 
retainers  for  the  meal  in  the  big  kitchen,  which  is 
one  of  my  prized  privileges.  A  dozen  of  us  sat  at  the 
long  oilcloth-covered  table  and  assuaged  the  more 
urgent  pangs  of  hunger  in  a  haste  that  was  speechless 
and  far  from  hygienic.  No  man  of  us  chewed  the 
new  beef  a  proper  number  of  times;  he  swallowed 
intently  and  reached  for  more.  It  was  rather  like 
twenty  minutes  for  dinner  at  what  our  railway 
laureates  call  an  eating  house.  Lew  Wee  shuffled 
in  bored  nonchalance  between  range  and  table.  It 
was  an  old  story  to  him. 

The  meal  might  have  gone  to  a  silent  end,  though 
moderating  in  pace;  but  we  had  with  us  to-day — as 
a  toastmaster  will  put  it — the  young  veterinary  from 
Spokane.  This  made  for  talk  after  actual  starva 
tion  had  been  averted — fragmentary  gossip  of  the 
great  city ;  of  neighbouring  ranches  in  the  valley,  where 

318 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  319 

professional  duty  had  called  him;  of  Adolph,  our 
milk-strain  Durham  bull,  whose  indisposition  had 
brought  him  several  times  to  Arrowhead;  and  then  of 
Squat,  our  youngest  cowboy,  from  whose  fair  brow 
the  intrepid  veterinary,  on  his  last  previous  visit, 
had  removed  a  sizable  and  embarrassing  wen  with 
what  looked  to  me  like  a  pair  of  pruning  shears. 

The  feat  had  excited  much  uncheerful  comment 
among  Squat's  confreres,  bets  being  freely  offered  that 
he  would  be  disfigured  for  life,  even  if  he  survived; 
and  what  was  the  sense  of  monkeying  with  a  thing 
like  that  when  you  could  pull  your  hat  down  over  it? 
Of  course  you  couldn't  wear  a  derby  with  it;  but  no 
one  but  a  darned  town  dude  would  ever  want  to  wear 
a  derby  hat,  anyway,  and  the  trouble  with  Squat 
was,  he  wished  to  be  pretty.  It  was  dollars  to 
doughnuts  the  thing  would  come  right  back  again, 
twice  as  big  as  ever,  and  better  well  enough  alone. 
But  Squat,  who  is  also  known  as  Timberline,  and  is, 
therefore,  a  lanky  six  feet  three,  is  young  and  sen 
sitive  and  hopeful,  and  the  veterinary  is  a  matchless 
optimist;  and  the  thing  had  been  brought  to  a  happy 
conclusion. 

Squat,  being  now  warmly  urged,  blushingly  turned 
his  head  from  side  to  side  that  all  might  remark  how 
neatly  his  scar  had  healed.  The  veterinary  said  it 
had  healed  by  first  intention;  that  it  was  as  pretty  a 
job  as  he'd  ever  done  on  man  or  beast;  and  that  Squat 
would  be  more  of  a  hit  then  ever  with  the  ladies 
because  of  this  interesting  chapter  in  his  young  life. 


320  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Then  something  like  envy  shone  in  the  eyes  of  those 
who  had  lately  disparaged  Squat  for  presuming  to 
thwart  the  will  of  God ;  I  detected  in  more  than  one  man 
there  the  secret  wish  that  he  had  something  for  this 
ardent  expert  to  eliminate.  Squat  continued  to  blush 
pleasurably  and  to  bolt  his  food  until  another  topic 
diverted  this  entirely  respectful  attention  from  him. 
The  veterinary  asked  if  we  had  heard  about  the 
Indian  ruction  down  at  Kulanche  last  night — Ku- 
lanche  Springs  being  the  only  pretense  to  a  town 
between  our  ranch  and  Red  Gap — a  post-office,  three 
general  stores,  a  score  of  dwellings,  and  a  low  drinking 
place  known  as  The  Swede's.  The  news  had  not 
come  to  us;  so  the  veterinary  obliged.  A  dozen 
Indians,  drifting  into  the  valley  for  the  haying  about 
to  begin,  had  tarried  near  Kulanche  and  bought 
whiskey  of  the  Swede.  The  selling  of  this  was  a  law 
less  proceeding  and  the  consumption  of  it  by  the 
purchasers  had  been  hazardous  in  the  extreme. 
Briefly,  the  result  had  been  what  is  called  in  news 
paper  headlines  a  stabbing  affray.  I  quote  from  our 
guest's  recital: 

"Then,  after  they  got  calmed  down  and  hid  their 
knives,  and  it  looked  peaceful  again,  they  decided 
to  start  all  over;  but  the  liquor  was  out,  so  that  old 
scar-faced  Pyann  jumps  on  a  pony  and  rides  over 
from  the  camp  for  a  fresh  supply.  He  pulled  up  out 
in  front  of  the  Swede's  and  yelled  for  three  bottles 
to  be  brought  out  to  him,  pronto!  If  he'd  sneaked 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  321 

round  to  the  back  door  and  whispered  he'd  have  got 
it  all  right,  but  this  was  a  little  too  brash,  because 
there  were  about  a  dozen  men  in  the  bar  and  the 
Swede  was  afraid  to  sell  an  Injin  whiskey  so  openly. 
All  he  could  do  was  go  to  the  door  and  tell  this 
pickled  aborigine  that  he  never  sold  whiskey  to  In j ins 
and  to  get  the  hell  out  of  there!  Pyann  called  the 
Swede  a  liar  and  some  other  things,  mentioning  dates, 
and  started  to  climb  off  his  pony,  very  ugly. 

"The  Swede  wasn't  going  to  argue  about  it,  because 
we'd  all  come  out  in  front  to  listen;  so  he  pulled  his 
gun  and  let  it  off  over  Pyann's  head;  and  a  couple  of 
the  boys  did  the  same  thing,  and  that  started  the 
rest — about  six  others  had  guns — till  it  sounded  like 
a  bunch  of  giant  crackers  going  off.  Old  Pyann  left 
in  haste,  all  right.  He  was  flattened  out  on  his  pony 
till  he  looked  like  a  plaster. 

"We  didn't  hear  any  more  of  him  last  night,  but 
coming  up  here  this  morning  I  found  out  he'd  done  a 
regular  Paul  Revere  ride  to  save  his  people;  he  rode 
clear  up  as  far  as  that  last  camp,  just  below  here,  on 
your  place,  yelling  to  every  Injin  he  passed  that  they'd 
better  take  to  the  brush,  because  the  whites  had 
broken  out  at  Kulanche.  At  that,  the  Swede  ought 
to  be  sent  up,  knowing  they'll  fight  every  time  he  sells 
them  whiskey.  Two  of  these  last  night  were  bad 
cut  in  this  rumpus." 

"Yes;  and  he'd  ought  to  be  sent  up  for  life  for 
selling  it  to  white  men,  too — the  kind  he  sells." 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

This  was  Sandy  Sawtelle,  speaking  as  one  who  knew 
and  with  every  sign  of  conviction.  "It  sure  is  enter 
prising  whiskey.  Three  drinks  of  it  make  a  decent 
man  want  to  kill  his  little  golden-haired  baby  sister 
with  an  axe.  Say,  here's  a  good  one — lemme  tell  you ! 
I  remember  the  first  time,  about  three,  four  years 
ago " 

The  speaker  was  interrupted — it  seemed  to  me  with 
intentional  rudeness.  One  man  hurriedly  wished  to 
know  who  did  the  cutting  last  night;  another,  if  the 
wounded  would  recover;  and  a  third,  if  Pete,  an 
aged  red  vassal  of  our  own  ranch,  had  been  involved. 
Each  of  the  three  flashed  a  bored  glance  at  Sandy  as 
he  again  tried  for  speech: 

"Well,  as  I  was  saying,  I  remember  the  first  time, 
about  three,  four  years  ago " 

"If  old  Pete  was  down  there  I  bet  his  brother-in- 
law  did  most  of  the  knifework,"  put  in  Buck  Devine 
firmly. 

It  was  to  be  seen  that  they  all  knew  what  Sandy 
remembered  the  first  time  and  wished  not  to  hear  it 
again.  Others  of  them  now  sought  to  stifle  the 
memoir,  while  Sandy  waited  doggedly  for  the  tide  to 
ebb.  I  gathered  that  our  Pete  had  not  been  one  of 
the  restive  convives,  he  being  known  to  have  spent  a 
quiet  home  evening  with  his  mahala  and  their  numer 
ous  descendants,  in  their  camp  back  of  the  wood  lot; 
I  also  gathered  that  Pete's  brother-in-law  had  com 
mitted  no  crime  since  Pete  quit  drinking  two  years 
before.  There  was  veiled  mystery  in  these  allusions 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  323 

to  the  brother-in-law  of  Pete.  It  was  almost  plain 
that  the  brother-in-law  was  a  lawless  person  for 
whose  offenses  Pete  had  more  than  once  been  un 
justly  blamed.  I  awaited  details;  but  meantime 

"Well,  as  I  was  saying,  I  remember  the  first  time, 
about  three,  four  years  ago " 

Sandy  had  again  dodged  through  a  breach  in  the 
talk,  quite  as  if  nothing  had  happened.  Buck  De- 
vine  groaned  as  if  in  unbearable  anguish.  The  others 
also  groaned  as  if  in  unbearable  anguish.  Only  the 
veterinary  and  I  were  polite. 

"Oh,  let  him  get  it  off  en  his  chest,"  urged  Buck 
wearily.  "He'll  perish  if  he  don't — having  two  men 
here  that  never  heard  him  tell  it."  He  turned  upon 
the  raconteur,  with  a  large  sweetness  of  manner: 
"Excuse  me,  Mr.  Sawtelle!  Pray  do  go  on  with  your 
thrilling  reminiscence.  I  could  just  die  listening  to 
you.  I  believe  you  was  wishing  to  entertain  the 
company  with  one  of  them  anecdotes  or  lies  of  which 
you  have  so  rich  a  store  in  that  there  peaked  dome  of 
yours.  Gents,  a  moment's  silence  while  this  rare 
personality  unfolds  hisself  to  us!" 

"Say,  lemme  tell  you — here's  a  good  one!"  resumed 
the  still  placid  Sandy.  "I  remember  the  first  time, 
about  three,  four  years  ago,  I  ever  went  into  The 
Swede's.  A  stranger  goes  in  just  ahead  of  me 
and  gets  to  the  bar  before  I  do,  kind  of  a  solemn- 
looking,  sandy-complected  little  runt  in  black 
clothes. 

'  *A  little  of  your  best  cooking  whiskey,'  says  he  to 


324  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

the  Swede,  while  I'm  waiting  beside  him  for  my  own 
drink. 

"The  Swede  sets  out  the  bottle  and  glass  and  a 
whisk  broom  on  the  bar.  That  was  sure  a  new 
combination  on  me.  'Why  the  whisk  broom?'  I  says 
to  myself.  T  been  in  lots  of  swell  dives  and  never 
see  no  whisk  broom  served  with  a  drink  before.' 
So  I  watch.  Well,  this  sad-looking  sot  pours  out  his 
liquor,  shoots  it  into  him  with  one  tip  of  the  glass; 
and,  like  he'd  been  shot,  he  falls  flat  on  the  floor,  all 
bent  up  in  a  convulsion — yes,  sir;  just  like  that! 
And  the  Swede  not  even  looking  over  the  bar  at  him! 

"In  a  minute  he  comes  out  of  this  here  fit,  gets  on 
his  feet  and  up  to  the  bar,  grabs  the  whisk  broom, 
brushes  the  dust  off  his  clothes  where  he's  rolled  on 
the  floor,  puts  back  the  whisk  broom,  says,  'So  long, 
Ed!'  to  the  Swede — and  goes  out  in  a  very  business 
like  manner. 

"Then  the  Swede  shoves  the  bottle  and  a  glass  and 
the  whisk  broom  over  in  front  of  me,  but  I  says: 
'No,  thanks !  I  just  come  in  to  pass  the  time  of  day. 
Lovely  weather  we're  having,  ain't  it?'  Yes,  sir; 
down  he  goes  like  he's  shot,  wriggles  a  minute,  jumps 
up,  dusts  hisself  off,  flies  out  the  door;  and  the  Swede 
passing  me  the  same  bottle  and  the  same  broom, 
and  me  saying:  'Oh,  I  just  come  in  to  pass  the  time 
of '" 

The  veterinary  and  I  had  been  gravely  attentive. 
The  faces  of  the  others  wore  not  even  the  tribute  of 
pretended  ennui.  They  had  betrayed  an  elaborate 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  325 

deafness.  They  now  affected  to  believe  that  Sandy 
Sawtelle  had  not  related  an  anecdote.  They  spoke 
casually  and  with  an  effect  of  polished  ease  while  yet 
here  capitulated,  as  tale-tellers  so  often  will. 

"I  remember  a  kid,  name  of  Henry  Lippincott,  used 
to  set  in  front  of  me  at  school,"  began  Buck  Devine, 
with  the  air  of  delicately  breaking  a  long  silence; 
"he'd  wiggle  his  ears  and  get  me  to  laughing  out 
loud,  and  then  I'd  be  called  up  for  it  by  teacher  and 
like  as  not  kept  in  at  recess." 

"You  ought  to  seen  that  bunch  of  tame  alligators 
down  to  the  San  Francisco  Fair,"  observed  Squat 
genially.  "The  old  boy  that  had  'em  says  'Oh,  yes, 
they  would  make  fine  pets,  and  don't  I  want  a  couple 
for  ten  dollars  to  take  home  to  the  little  ones?' 
But  I  don't.  You  come  right  down  to  household 
pets — I  ruther  have  me  a  white  rabbit  or  a  canary 
bird  than  an  alligator  you  could  step  on  in  the  dark 
some  night  and  get  all  bit  up,  and  mebbe  blood 
poison  set  in." 

"I  recollect  same  as  if  it  was  yesterday,"  began 
Uncle  Abner  quickly.  "We  was  coming  up  through 
northern  Arizona  one  fall,  with  a  bunch  of  longhorns, 
and  we  make  this  here  water  hole  about  four  p.  M. — 
or  mebbe  a  mite  after  that  or  a  little  before;  but,  any 
way,  I  says  to  Jeff  Bradley,  'Jeff,'  I  says  to  him,  *it 
looks  to  me  almighty  like '  ' 

Sandy  Sawtelle  savagely  demanded  a  cup  of  coffee, 
gulped  it  heroically,  rose  in  a  virtuous  hurry,  and  at 
the  door  wondered  loudly  if  he  was  leaving  a  bunch  of 


326  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

rich  millionaires  that  had  nothing  to  do  but  loaf  in 
their  club  all  the  afternoon  and  He  their  heads  off,  or 
just  a  passell  of  lazy  no-good  cowhands  that  laid 
down  on  the  job  the  minute  the  boss  stepped  off  the 
place.  Whereupon,  it  being  felt  that  the  rabid 
anecdotist  had  been  sufficiently  rebuked,  we  all 
went  out  to  help  the  veterinary  look  at  Adolph  for 
twenty  minutes  more. 

Adolph  is  four  years  old  and  weighs  one  ton.  He 
has  a  frowning  and  fearsome  front  and  the  spirit  of  a 
friendly  puppy.  The  Arrowhead  force  loafed  about 
in  the  corral  and  imparted  of  its  own  lore  to  the 
veterinary  while  he  took  Adolph's  temperature. 
Then  Adolph,  after  nosing  three  of  the  men  to  have 
his  head  rubbed,  went  to  stand  in  the  rush-grown 
pool  at  the  far  end  of  the  corral,  which  the  gallery 
took  to  mean  that  he  still  had  a  bit  of  fever,  no  matter 
what  the  glass  thing  said. 

The  veterinary  opposed  a  masterly  silence  to  this 
majority  diagnosis,  and  in  the  absence  of  argument 
about  it  there  seemed  nothing  left  for  the  Arrowhead 
retainers  but  the  toil  for  which  they  were  paid. 
They  went  to  it  lingeringly,  one  by  one,  seeming  to 
feel  that  perhaps  they  wronged  the  ailing  Adolph 
by  not  staying  there  to  talk  him  over. 

Uncle  Abner,  who  is  the  Arrowhead  blacksmith, 
was  the  last  to  leave — or  think  of  leaving — though 
he  had  mule  shoes  to  shape  and  many  mules  to  shoe. 
He  glanced  wistfully  again  at  Adolph,  in  cool  water 
to  his  knees,  tugged  at  his  yellowish-white  beard, 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          327 

said  it  was  a  dog's  life,  if  any  one  should  ask  me,  and 
was  about  to  slump  mournfully  off  to  his  shop — when 
his  eye  suddenly  brightened. 

"Will  you  look  once  at  that  poor  degraded  red 
heathen,  acting  like  a  whirlwind  over  in  the  woodlot?" 

I  looked  once.  Pete,  our  Indian,  was  apparently 
the  sole  being  on  the  ranch  at  that  moment  who  was 
honestly  earning  his  wage.  No  one  knows  how  many 
more  than  eighty  years  Pete  has  lived;  but  from  where 
we  stood  he  was  the  figure  of  puissant  youth,  rhythmi 
cally  flashing  his  axe  into  bits  of  wood  that  flew  apart 
at  its  touch.  Uncle  Abner,  beside  me,  had  again 
shrugged  off  the  dread  incubus  of  duty.  He  let  him 
self  go  restf  ully  against  the  corral  bars  and  chuckled  a 
note  of  harsh  derision. 

"Ain't  it  disgusting!  I  bet  he  never  saw  the  boss 
when  she  rode  off  this  A.  M.  Yes,  sir;  that  poor 
benighted  pagan  must  think  she's  still  in  the  house — 
prob'ly  watching  him  out  of  the  east  winder  this  very 
minute." 

"What's  this  about  his  brother-in-law?"  I  asked. 

"Oh,  I  dunno;  some  silly  game  he  tries  to  come  the 
roots  over  folks  with.  Say,  he's  a  regular  old  mur 
derer,  and  not  an  honest  hair  in  his  head!  Look  at 
the  old  cheat  letting  on  to  be  a  good  steady  worker 
because  he  thinks  the  boss  is  in  the  house  there,  keep 
ing  an  eye  on  him.  Ain't  it  downright  disgusting!" 

Uncle  Abner  said  this  as  one  supremely  conscious 
of  his  own  virtue.  He  himself  was  descending  to  no 
foul  pretense. 


328  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"A  murderer,  is  he?" 

I  opened  my  cigarette  case  to  the  man  of  probity. 
He  took  two,  crumpled  the  tobacco  from  the  papers 
and  stuffed  it  into  his  calabash  pipe. 

"Sure  is  he  a  murderer !     A  tough  one,  too." 

The  speaker  moved  round  a  corner  of  the  barn  and 
relaxed  to  a  sitting  posture  on  the  platform  of  the 
pump.  It  brought  him  into  the  sun;  but  it  also 
brought  him  where  he  could  see  far  down  the  road 
upon  which  his  returning  employer  would  eventually 
appear.  His  eyes  ever  haunted  the  far  vistas  of  that 
road;  otherwise  he  remained  blissfully  static. 

It  should  perhaps  be  frankly  admitted  that  Uncle 
Abner  is  not  the  blacksmith  of  song  and  story  and 
lithographed  art  treasure,  suitable  for  framing.  That 
I  have  never  beheld  this  traditional  smith — the 
rugged,  upstanding  tower  of  brawn  with  muscles  like 
iron  bands — is  beside  the  point.  I  have  not  looked 
upon  all  the  blacksmiths  in  the  world,  and  he  may 
exist.  But  Uncle  Abner  can't  pose  for  him.  He 
weighs  a  hundred  and  twenty  pounds  without  his 
hammer,  is  lean  to  scrawniness,  and  his  arms  are  those 
of  the  boys  you  see  at  the  track  meet  of  Lincoln 
Grammar  School  Number  Seven.  The  mutilated 
derby  hat  he  now  wore,  a  hat  that  had  been  weath 
ered  from  plum  colour  to  a  poisonous  green — a  shred 
of  peacock  feather  stuck  in  the  band — lent  his  face 
no  dignity  whatever. 

In  truth,  his  was  not  an  easy  face  to  lend  dignity 
to.  It  would  still  look  foolish,  no  matter  what  was 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  329 

lent  it.  He  has  a  smug  fringe  of  white  curls  about 
the  back  and  sides  of  his  head,  the  beard  of  a  prophet, 
and  the  ready  speech  of  a  town  bore.  The  black 
smith  we  read  of  can  look  the  whole  world  in  the  face, 
fears  not  any  man,  and  would  far  rather  do  honest 
smithing  any  day  in  the  week — except  Sunday — 
than  live  the  life  of  sinful  ease  that  Uncle  Abner  was 
leading  for  the  moment. 

Uncle  Abner  may  have  feared  no  man;  but  he  feared 
a  woman.  It  was  easy  to  see  this  as  he  chatted  the 
golden  hours  away  to  me.  His  pale  eyes  seldom  left 
the  road  where  it  came  over  a  distant  hill.  When  the 

woman  did  arrive Oh,  surely  the  merry  clang 

of  the  hammer  on  the  anvil  would  be  heard  in  Ab- 
ner's  shop,  where  he  led  a  dog's  life.  But,  for  a 

time  at  least 

"So  he's  one  of  these  tough  murderers,  is  he?" 
"You  said  it!  Always  a-creating  of  disturbances 
up  on  the  reservation,  where  he  rightly  belongs. 
Mebbe  that's  why  they  let  him  go  off.  Anyway, 
he  never  stays  there.  Even  in  his  young  days  they 
tell  me  he  wouldn't  stay  put.  He'd  disappear  for 
a  month  and  always  come  back  with  a  new  wife. 
Talk  about  your  Mormons !  One  time  they  sent  out 
a  new  agent  to  the  reservation,  and  he  hears  talk 
back  and  forth  of  Pete  philandering  thisaway;  and 
he  had  his  orders  from  the  Gov'ment  at  Washington, 
D.  C.,  to  stamp  out  this  here  poly-gamy — or  what 
ever  you  call  it;  so  he  orders  Pete  up  on  the  carpet 
and  says  to  him:  'Look  here  now,  Pete!  You  got 


330          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

a  regular  wife,  ain't  you?'  Pete  says  sure  he  has; 
and  how  could  he  say  anything  else — the  old  liar! 
'Well,'  says  Mr.  Agent,  *I  want  you  to  get  this  one 
regular  wife  of  yours  and  lead  a  decent,  orderly  home 
life  with  her;  and  don't  let  me  hear  no  more  scanda 
lous  reports  about  your  goings  on.' 

"Pete  says  all  right;  but  he  allows  he'll  have  to 
have  help  in  getting  her  back  home,  because  she's 
got  kind  of  antagonistic  and  left  him.  The  agent 
says  he'll  put  a  stop  to  that  if  Pete'll  just  point  her 
out.  So  they  ride  down  about  a  mile  from  the 
agency  to  a  shack  where  they's  a  young  squaw  out 
in  front  graining  a  deerhide  and  minding  her  own 
business.  She  looked  up  when  they  come  and  started 
to  jaw  Pete  something  fierce;  but  the  agent  tells 
her  the  Gov'ment  frowns  on  wives  running  off,  and 
Pete  grabbed  her;  and  the  agent  he  helps,  with  her 
screeching  and  biting  and  clawing  like  a  female 
demon.  The  agent  is  going  to  see  that  Pete  has 
his  rights,  even  if  it  don't  seem  like  a  joyous  house 
hold;  and  finally  they  get  her  scrambled  onto  Pete's 
horse  in  front  of  him  and  off  they  go  up  the  trail. 
The  agent  yells  after  'em  that  Pete  is  to  remember 
that  this  is  his  regular  wife  and  he'd  better  behave 
himself  from  now  on. 

"And  then  about  sunup  next  morning  this  agent 
is  woke  up  by  a  pounding  on  his  door.  He  goes 
down  and  here's  Pete  clawed  to  a  frazzle  and  whim 
pering  for  the  law's  protection  because  his  squaw 
has  chased  him  over  the  reservation  all  night  trying 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          331 

to  Ml  him.  She'd  near  done  it,  too.  They  say  old 
Pete  was  so  scared  the  agent  had  to  soothe  him  like  a 
mother.*' 

Uncle  Abner  paused  to  relight  his  pipe,  mean 
time  negotiating  a  doubly  vigilant  survey  of  the 
distant  road.  But  I  considered  that  he  had  told  me 
nothing  to  the  discredit  of  Pete,  and  now  said  as 
much. 

"You  couldn't  blame  the  man  for  wanting  his 
wife  back,  could  you?"  I  demanded.  "Of  course 
he  might  have  been  more  tactful." 

"Tactf ul's  the  word,"  agreed  Uncle  Abner  cor 
dially.  "  You  see,  this  wasn't  Pete's  wife  at  all.  She 
was  just  a  young  squaw  he'd  took  a  fancy  to." 

"Oh!"  Nothing  else  seemed  quite  so  fitting  to 
say. 

"'Nother  time,"  resumed  the  honest  blacksmith, 
"the  Gov'ment  at  Washington,  D.  C.,  sent  out  or 
ders  for  all  the  Injun  kids  to  be  sent  off  to  school. 
Lots  of  the  fathers  made  trouble  about  this,  but 
Pete  was  the  worst  of  all — the  old  scoundrel!  The 
agent  said  to  him  would  Pete  send  his  kids  peaceful; 
and  Pete  said  not  by  no  means.  So  the  agent  says 
in  that  case  they'll  have  to  take  'em  by  force.  Pete 
says  he'll  be  right  there  a-plenty  when  they're  took 
by  force.  So  next  day  the  agent  and  his  helper  go 
down  to  Pete's  tepee.  It's  pitched  up  on  a  bank  just 
off  the  road  and  they's  a  low  barrier  of  brush  acrost 
the  front  of  it.  They  look  close  at  this  and  see  the 
muzzle  of  a  rifle  peeking  down  at  'em;  also,  they  can 


332          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

hear  little  scramblings  and  squealings  of  about  a 
dozen  or  fourteen  kids  in  the  tepee  that  was  likely 
nestled  up  round  the  old  murderer  like  a  bunch  of 
young  quail. 

"Well,  they  was  something  kind  of  cold  and 
cheerless  about  the  muzzle  of  this  rifle  poked  through 
the  brush  at  'em;  so  the  agent  starts  in  and  makes  a 
regular  agent  speech  to  Pete.  He  says  the  Great 
White  Father  at  Washington,  D.  C.,  has  wished  his 
children  to  be  give  an  English  education  and  learnt 
to  write  a  good  business  hand,  and  all  like  that; 
and  read  books,  and  so  on;  and  the  Great  White 
Father  will  be  peeved  if  Pete  takes  it  in  this  rough 
way.  And  the  agent  is  disappointed  in  him,  too, 
and  will  never  again  think  the  same  of  his  old  friend, 
and  why  can't  he  be  nice  and  submit  to  the  decencies 
of  civilization — and  so  on — a  lot  of  guff  like  that; 
but  all  the  time  he  talks  this  here  rifle  is  pointing 
right  into  his  chest,  so  you  can  bet  he  don't  make  no 
false  motions. 

"At  last,  when  he's  told  Pete  all  the  reasons  he 
can  think  up  and  guesses  mebbe  he's  got  the  old  boy 
going,  he  winds  up  by  saying:  'And  now  what  shall 
I  tell  the  Great  White  Father  at  Washington  you 
say  to  his  kind  words?'  Old  Pete,  still  not  moving 
the  rifle  a  hair's  breadth,  he  calls  out:  'You  tell  the 
Great  White  Father  at  Washington  to  go  to  hell!' 
Yes,  sir;  just  like  that  he  says  it;  and  I  guess  that 
shows  you  what  kind  of  a  murderer  he  is.  And  what 
I  allus  say  is,  'what's  the  use  of  spending  us  tax- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  333 

payers'  good  money  trying  to  educate  trash  like  that, 
when  they  ain't  got  no  sense  of  decency  in  the  first 
place,  and  the  minute  they  learn  to  talk  English 
they  begin  to  curse  and  swear  as  bad  as  a  white  man? 
They  got  no  wish,  to  improve  their  condition,  which 
is  what  I  allus  have  said  and  what  I  allus  will  say. 

"Anyway,  this  agent  didn't  waste  no  more  time 
on  Pete's  brats.  He  come  right  away  from  there, 
though  telling  his  helper  it  was  a  great  pity  they 
couldn't  have  got  a  good  look  into  the  tepee,  because 
then  they'd  have  known  for  the  first  time  just  what 
kids  round  there  Pete  really  considered  his.  Of 
course  he  hadn't  felt  he  should  lay  down  his  life  in 
the  interests  of  this  trifling  information,  and  I  don't 
blame  him  one  bit.  I  wouldn't  have  done  it  myself. 
You  can't  tell  me  a  reservation  with  Pete  on  it  would 
be  any  nice  place.  Look  at  the  old  crook  now,  still 
lamming  that  axe  round  to  beat  the  cars  because  he 
thinks  he's  being  watched !  I  bet  he'll  be  mad  down 
to  his  moccasins  when  he  finds  out  the  Old  Lady's 
been  off  all  day." 

Uncle  Abner  yawned  and  stretched  his  sun-baked 
form  with  weary  rectitude.  Then  he  looked  with 
pleased  dismay  into  the  face  of  his  silver  watch. 

"Now,  I  snum!  Here  she's  two-thirty!  Don't 
it  beat  all  how  time  flits  by,  as  it  were,  when  you 
meet  a  good  conversationalist  and  get  started  on 
various  topics!  Well,  I  guess  like  as  not  I  better 
amble  along  over  toward  the  little  shop  and  see  if 
they  ain't  some  little  thing  to  be  puttered  at  round 


334          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

there.  Yes,  sir;  all  play  and  no  work  makes  Jack 
a  dull  boy,  as  the  saying  is." 

The  honest  fellow  achieved  a  few  faltering  paces 
in  the  general  direction  of  his  shop.  Then  he  turned 
brightly. 

"A  joke's  a  joke,  all  right;  but,  after  all,  I  hate  to 
see  old  Pete  working  hisself  into  the  grave  that  way, 
even  if  he  ain't  a  regular  human  being.  Suppose 
you  loaf  over  there  and  put  him  wise  that  the  Mad 
am's  been  off  the  place  since  sunup.  The  laugh's 
on  him  enough  already." 

Which  showed  that  Uncle  Abner  had  not  really  a 
bad  heart.  And  I  did  even  as  he  had  said. 

Pete  was  instantly  stilled  by  my  brief  but  in 
forming  speech.  He  leaned  upon  his  axe  and  gazed 
at  me  with  shocked  wonder.  The  face  of  the 
American  Indian  is  said  to  be  unrevealing — to  be  a 
stoic  mask  under  which  his  emotions  are  ever  hidden. 
For  a  second  time  this  day  I  found  tradition  at  fault. 
Pete's  face  was  lively  and  eloquent  under  his  shock 
of  dead-black  hair — dead  black  but  for  half  a  dozen 
gray  or  grayish  strands,  for  Pete's  eighty  years  have 
told  upon  him,  even  if  he  is  not  yet  sufficiently  gray 
at  the  temples  to  be  a  hero  in  a  magazine  costing  over 
fifteen  cents.  His  face  is  a  richly  burnished  mahog 
any  and  tells  little  of  his  years  until  he  smiles;  then 
from  brow  to  pointed  chin  it  cracks  into  a  million 
tiny  wrinkles,  an  intricate  network  of  them  framing 
his  little  black  eyes,  which  are  lashless,  and  radiating 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  335 

from  the  small  mouth  to  the  high  cheek  bones  of  his 
race. 

His  look  as  he  eyed  me  became  utter  consternation; 
then  humour  slowly  lightened  the  little  eyes.  He 
lifted  the  eyes  straight  into  the  glare  of  the  un- 
dimmed  sun;  nor  did  they  blink  as  they  noted  the 
hour.  "My  good  gosh!"  he  muttered;  then  stalked 
slowly  round  the  pile  of  stove  wood  that  had  been 
spreading  since  morning.  He  seemed  aggrieved — 
yet  humorously  aggrieved — as  he  noted  its  noble 
dimensions.  He  cast  away  the  axe  and  retrieved  some 
outflung  sticks,  which  he  cunningly  adjusted  to  the 
main  pile  to  make  it  appear  still  larger  to  the  casual 
eye. 

"My  good  gosh!"  he  muttered  again.  "My  old 
mahala  she  tell  me  Old  Lady  Pettengill  go  off  early 
this  morning;  but  I  think  she  make  one  big  mistake. 
Now  what  you  know  about  that?"  He  smiled  win- 
ningly  now  and  became  a  very  old  man  indeed,  the 
smile  lighting  the  myriad  minute  wrinkles  that  in 
stantly  came  to  life.  Again  he  ruefully  surveyed 
the  morning's  work.  "I  think  that  caps  the  cli 
max,"  said  he,  and  grimanced  humorous  dismay  for 
the  entertainment  of  us  both. 

I  opened  my  cigarette  case  to  him.  Like  his  late 
critic,  Pete  availed  himself  of  two,  though  he  had 
not  the  excuse  of  a  pipe  to  be  filled.  One  he  coyly 
tucked  above  his  left  ear  and  one  he  lighted.  Then 
he  sat  gracefully  back  upon  his  heels  and  drew  smoke 
into  his  innermost  recesses,  a  shrunken  little  figure  of 


336  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

a  man  in  a  calico  shirt  of  gay  stripes,  faded  blue  over 
alls,  and  shoes  that  were  remarkable  as  ruins.  With 
a  pointed  chip  in  the  slender  fingers  of  one  lean  brown 
hand — a  narrow  hand  of  quite  feminine  delicacy — he 
cleared  the  ground  of  other  chips  and  drew  small 
figures  in  the  earth. 

"Some  of  your  people  cut  up  in  a  fight  down  at 
Kulanche  last  night,"  I  remarked  after  a  moment  of 
courteous  waiting. 

"Mebbe,"  said  Pete,  noncommittal. 

"Were  you  down  there?" 

"I  never  kill  a  man  with  a  knife,"  said  Pete;  "that 
ain't  my  belief." 

He  left  an  opening  that  tempted,  but  I  thought  it 
wise  to  ignore  that  for  the  moment. 

"You  an  old  man,  Pete?" 

"Mebbe." 

"How  old?" 

"Oh,  so-so." 

"You  remember  a  long  time  ago — how  long?" 

He  drew  a  square  in  his  cleared  patch  of  earth,  sub 
divided  it  into  little  squares,  and  dotted  each  of  these 
in  the  centre  before  he  spoke. 

"When  Modocs  have  big  soldier  fight." 

"YouaModoc?" 

"B'lieveme!" 

"When  Captain  Jack  fought  the  soldiers  over  in 
the  Lava  Beds?" 

"Some  fight — b'lieve  me!"  said  Pete,  erasing  his 
square  and  starting  a  circle. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  337 

"You  fight,  too?" 

"Too  small;  I  do  little  odd  jobs — when  big  Injin 
kill  soldier  I  skin  um  head." 

I  begged  for  further  items,  but  Pete  seemed  to  feel 
that  he  had  been  already  verbose.  He  dismissed  the 
historic  action  with  a  wise  saying: 

"Killing  soldiers  all  right;  but  it  don't  settle 
nothing."  He  drew  a  triangle. 

Indelicately  then  I  pried  into  his  spiritual  life. 

"You  a  Christian,  Pete?" 

"  In j in-Christian,"  he  amended— as  one  would  say 
"  Progressive-Republican." 

"Believe  in  God?" 

"Two."  This  was  a  guarded  admission;  I  caught 
his  side  glance. 

"Which  ones?"  I  asked  it  cordially;  and  Pete 
smiled  as  one  who  detects  a  brother  liberal  in  the 
ology. 

"Injin  God;  Christian  God.  Injin  God  go  like 

this "  He  brushed  out  his  latest  figure  and  drew 

a  straight  line  a  foot  long.  And  Christian  God  go  so 
— he  drew  a  second  straight  line  perpendicular  to 
the  first.  I  was  made  to  see  the  line  of  his  own  God 
extending  over  the  earth  some  fifty  feet  above  its  sur 
face,  while  the  line  of  the  Christian  God  went  straight 
and  endlessly  into  the  heavens.  "Injin  God  stay 
close — Christian  God  go  straight  up.  Whoosh!" 
He  looked  toward  the  zenith  to  indicate  the  vanishing 
line.  "I  think  mebbe  both  O.  K.  You  think  both 
O.  K?" 


338          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"Mebbe,"  I  said. 

Pete  retraced  the  horizontal  line  of  his  own  God  and 
the  perpendicular  line  of  the  other. 

"Funny  business,"  said  he  tolerantly. 

"Funny  business,"  I  echoed.  And  then — the  mo 
ment  seeming  ripe  for  intimate  personal  research: 
"Pete,  how  about  that  brother-in-law  of  yours?  Is 
he  a  one-God  Christian  or  a  two-God,  like  you?" 

He  hurriedly  brushed  out  his  lines,  flashed  me  one  of 
his  uneasy  side  glances,  and  seemed  not  to  have  heard 
my  question.  He  sprang  lightly  from  his  heels, 
affected  to  scan  a  murky  cloud-bank  to  the  south, 
ignited  his  second  cigarette  from  the  first,  and  seemed 
relieved  by  the  actual  diversion  of  Laura,  his  present 
lawful  consort,  now  plodding  along  the  road  just  out 
side  the  fence. 

Laura  is  ponderous  and  billowy,  and  her  moonlike 
face  of  rusty  bronze  is  lined  to  show  that  she,  too,  has 
gone  down  a  little  into  the  vale  of  years.  She  was 
swathed  in  many  skirts,  her  shoulders  enveloped  by  a 
neutral-tinted  shawl,  and  upon  her  head  was  a  modish 
toque  of  light  straw,  garlanded  with  pink  roses.  This 
may  have  been  her  hunt  constume,  for  the  carcasses 
of  two  slain  rabbits  swung  jauntily  from  her  girdle. 
She  undulated  by  us  with  no  sign.  Pete's  glistening 
little  eyes  lingered  in  appraisal  upon  her  noble 
rotundities  and  her  dangling  quarry.  Then,  with  a 
graceful  flourish  of  the  new  cigarette,  he  paid  tribute 
to  the  ancient  fair. 

"That  old  mahala  of  mine,  she  not  able  to  chew 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  339 

much  now;  but  she's  some  swell  chicken — b'lieve 
me!" 

I  persisted  in  the  impertinence  he  had  sought  to 
turn. 

"How  about  this  brother-in-law  of  yours,  Pete?" 

Again  he  was  deaf.  He  picked  up  his  axe,  appear 
ing  to  weigh  the  resumption  of  his  task  against  a  reply 
to  this  straight  question.  He  must  have  found  the 
alternative  too  dreadful;  he  leaned  upon  the  axe,  thus 
winning  something  of  the  dignity  of  labour,  with  none 
of  its  pains,  and  grudgingly  asked: 

"Mebbe  some  liars  tell  you  in  conversation  about 
that  old  b'other-in-law?" 

"Of  course!  Many  nice  people  tell  me  every  day. 
They  tell  me  all  about  him.  I  rather  hear  you  tell 
me.  Is  he  a  Christian?" 

"He's  one  son-of-gun,  pure  and  simple — that  old 
feller.  He  caps  the  climax." 

"Yes;  I  know  all  about  that.  He's  a  bad  man.  I 
hear  everything  about  him.  Now  you  tell  me  again. 
You  can  tell  better  than  liars." 

"  One  genuine  son-of-gun ! "  persisted  Pete,  shrewdly 
keeping  to  general  terms. 

"Oh,  very  well!"  I  rose  from  the  log  I  was  sit 
ting  on,  yawning  my  indifference.  "I  know  every 
thing  he  ever  did.  Other  people  tell  me  all  the 
time." 

I  moved  off  a  few  steps  under  the  watchful  side 
glance.  It  worked.  One  of  Pete's  slim,  womanish 
hands  fluttered  up  in  a  movement  of  arrest. 


340          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"Those  liars  tell  you  about  one  time  he  shoot  white 
man  off  horse  going  by?" 

"Certainly!" 

"That  white  man  still  have  smallpox  to  give  all 
In j ins  he  travel  to;  so  they  go  V  vote  who  kill  him 
off  quick,  and  my  b'other-in-law  he  win  it." 

I  tried  to  look  as  if  this  were  a  bit  of  stale  gossip. 

"Then  whites  raise  hell  to  say  Pete  he  do  same. 
What  you  know  about  that?  My  old  b'other-in-law 
send  word  he  do  same — twenty,  fifty  Injin  witness  tell 
he  said  so — and  now  he  gon'  hide  far  off.  Dep'ty 
sheriff  can't  find  him.  That  son-of-gun  come  back 
next  year,  raise  big  fight  over  one  span  mules  with 
Injin  named  Walter  that  steal  my  mules  out  of  pas 
ture;  and  Walter  not  get  well  from  it — so  whites  say 
yes,  old  Pete  done  that  same  killing  scrape  to  have  his 
mules  again;  plain  as  the  nose  on  the  face  old  Pete  do 
same.  But  I  catch  plenty  Injin  witness  see  my 
b'other-in-law  do  same,  and  I  think  they  can't  catch 
him  another  time  once  more,  because  they  look  in  all 
places  he  ain't.  I  think  plenty  too  much  trouble  he 
make  all  time  for  me — perform  something  not  nice 
and  get  found  out  about  it;  and  all  people  say,  Oh, 
yes — that  old  Pete  he's  at  tricks  again;  he  better  get 
sent  to  Walla  Walla,  learn  some  good  trade  in  prison 
for  eighteen  years.  That  b'other-in-law  cap  the  cli 
max!  He  know  all  good  place  to  hide  from  dep'ty 
sheriff,  so  not  be  found  when  badly  wanted — the  son- 
of-gun!" 

Pete's  face  now  told  that,  despite  the  proper  loath- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          341 

ing  inspired  by  his  misdeeds,  this  brother-in-laWcom- 
pelled  a  certain  horrid  admiration  for  his  gift  of 
elusiveness. 

"What's  your  brother-in-law's  name?" 

Pete  deliberated  gravely. 

"In  my  opinion  his  name  Edward;  mebbe  Sam, 
mebbe  Charlie;  I  think  more  it's  Albert." 

"Well,  what  about  that  next  time  he  broke  out?" 

"Whoosh!  Damn  no-good  squaw  man  get  all  In- 
jins  drunk  on  whiskey;  then  play  poker  with  four  aces. 
'What  you  got?  No  good — four  aces — hard  luck — 
deal  'em  up!"  Pete's  flexible  wrists  here  flashed 
in  pantomime.  "Pretty  soon  Injin  got  no  mules,  no 
blanket,  no  spring  wagon,  no  gun,  no  new  boots,  no 
nine  dollars  my  old  mahala  gets  paid  for  three  bushel 
wild  plums  from  Old  Lady  Pettengill  to  make  canned 
goods  of — only  got  one  big  sick  head  from  all  night; 
see  four  aces,  four  kings,  four  jacks.  '  What  you  got, 
Pete?  No  good.  Full  house  here.  Hard  luck — my 
deal.  Have  another  drink,  old  top !' " 

"Well,  what  did  your  brother-in-law  do  when  he 
heard  about  this?" 

"Something!" 

"Shoot?" 

"Naw;  got  no  gun  left.  Choke  him  on  the  neck — 
I  think  this  way." 

The  supple  hands  of  Pete  here  clutched  his  corded 
throat,  fingertips  meeting  at  the  back,  and  two  po 
tent  thumbs  uniting  in  a  sinister  pressure  upon  his 
Adam's  apple.  To  further  enlarge  my  understanding 


342          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

he  contorted  his  face  unprettily.  From  rolling  eyes 
and  outthrust  tongue  it  was  apparent  that  the  squaw 
man  had  survived  long  enough  to  regret  the  in 
veteracy  of  his  good  luck  at  cards. 

"Then  what?" 

"Man  tell  you  before?"  He  eyed  me  with  frank 
suspicion. 

"Certainly;  you  tell,  too!" 

"That  b'other-in-law  he  win  everything  back  this 
poor  squaw  man  don't  need  no  more,  and  son-of-gun 
beat  it  quick;  so  all  liars  say  Old  Pete  turn  that  trick, 
but  can't  prove  same,  because  my  b'other-in-law 
do  same  in  solitude.  And  old  judge  say:  'Oh,  well, 
can't  prove  same  in  courthouse,  and  only  good  squaw 
man  is  dead  squaw  man;  so  what-the-bad-place!*  I 
think  mebbe." 

"Go  on;  what  about  that  next  time?" 

"You  know  already,"  said  Pete  firmly. 

"You  tell,  too." 

He  pondered  this,  his  keen  little  eyes  searching  my 
face  as  he  pensively  fondled  the  axe. 

"You  know  about  this  time  that  son-of-gun  go  'n* 
kill  a  bright  lawyer  in  Red  Gap?  I  think  that  cap 
the  climax!" 

"  Certainly,  I  know ! "   This  with  bored  impatience. 

"I  think,  then,  you  tell  me."  His  seamed  face 
was  radiant  with  cunning. 

"What's  the  use?    You  know  it  already." 

He  countered  swiftly: 

"What's  use  I  tell  you — you  know  already." 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  343 

I  yawned  again  flagrantly. 

"Now  you  tell  in  your  own  way  how  this  trouble 
first  begin,"  persisted  Pete  rather  astonishingly.  He 
seemed  to  quote  from  memory. 

Once  more  I  yawned,  turning  coldly  away. 

"You  tell  in  your  own  words,"  he  was  again  gently 
urging;  but  on  the  instant  his  axe  began  to  rain  blows 
upon  the  log  at  his  feet. 

Sounds  of  honest  toil  were  once  more  to  be  heard  in 
the  wood  lot;  and,  though  I  could  not  hear  the  other,  I 
surmised  that  the  sledge  of  Uncle  Abner  now  rang 
merrily  upon  his  anvil.  Both  he  and  Pete  had  doubt 
less  noted  at  the  same  moment  the  approach  of  Mrs. 
Lysander  John  Pettengill,  who  was  spurring  her 
jaded  roan  up  the  long  rise  from  the  creek  bottom. 

My  stalwart  hostess,  entirely  masculine  to  the  eye 
from  a  little  distance,  strode  up  from  the  corral, 
waved  a  quirt  at  me  in  greeting,  indicated  by  another 
gesture  that  she  was  dusty  and  tired,  and  vanished 
briskly  within  the  ranch  house.  Half  an  hour  later 
she  joined  me  in  the  living-room,  where  I  had  trifled 
with  ancient  magazines  and  stock  journals  on  the 
big  table.  Laced  boots,  riding  breeches,  and  army 
shirt  had  gone  for  a  polychrome  and  trailing  tea  gown, 
black  satin  slippers,  flashing  rhinestone  rosettes, 
and  silk  stockings  of  a  sinful  scarlet.  She  wore  a 
lace  boudoir  cap,  plenteously  beribboned,  and  her 
sunburned  nose  had  been  lavishly  powdered.  She 
looked  now  merely  like  an  indulged  matron  whose 


344  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

most  poignant  worry  would  be  a  sick  Pomeranian 
or  overnight  losses  at  bridge.  She  wished  to  know 
whether  I  would  have  tea  with  her.  I  would. 

Tea  consisted  of  bottled  beer  from  the  spring 
house,  half  a  ham,  and  a  loaf  of  bread.  It  should 
be  said  that  her  behaviour  toward  these  dainties, 
when  they  had  been  assembled,  made  her  seem  much 
less  the  worn  social  leader.  There  was  practically  no 
talk  for  ten  active  minutes.  A  high-geared  camera 
would  have  caught  everything  of  value  in  the  scene. 
It  was  only  as  I  decanted  a  second  bottle  of  beer  for 
the  woman  that  she  seemed  to  regain  consciousness 
of  her  surroundings.  The  spirit  of  her  first  attack 
upon  the  food  had  waned.  She  did  fashion  another 
sandwich  of  a  rugged  pattern,  but  there  was  a  hint 
of  the  dilettante  in  her  work. 

And  now  she  spoke.  Her  gaze  upon  the  maga 
zines  of  yesteryear  massed  at  the  lower  end  of  the 
table,  she  declared  they  must  all  be  scrapped,  be 
cause  they  too  painfully  reminded  her  of  a  dentist's 
waiting-room.  She  wondered  if  there  mustn't  be  a 
law  against  a  dentist  having  in  his  possession  a  maga 
zine  less  than  ten  years  old.  She  suspected  as  much. 

"There  I'll  be  sitting  in  Doc  Martingale's  office 
waiting  for  him  to  kill  me  by  inches,  and  I  pick  up  a 
magazine  to  get  my  mind  off  my  fate  and  find  I'm 
reading  a  timely  article,  with  illustrations,  about 
Cervera's  fleet  being  bottled  up  in  the  Harbour  of 
Santiago.  I  bet  he's  got  Godey's  Lady's  Book  for 
1862  round  there,  if  you  looked  for  it." 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          345 

Now  a  brief  interlude  for  the  ingestion  of  malt 
liquor,  followed  by  a  pained  recital  of  certain  com 
plications  of  the  morning. 

"That  darned  one-horse  post-office  down  to  Ku- 
lanche!  What  do  you  think?  I  wanted  to  send  a 
postal  card  to  the  North  American  Cleaning  and  Dye 
Works,  at  Red  Gap,  for  some  stuff  they  been  holding 
out  on  me  a  month,  and  that  office  didn't  have  a  single 
card  in  stock — nothing  but  some  of  these  fancy  ones 
in  a  rack  over  on  the  grocery  counter;  horrible  things 
with  pictures  of  brides  and  grooms  on  'em  in  coloured 
costumes,  with  sickening  smiles  on  their  faces,  and 
others  with  wedding  bells  ringing  out  or  two  doves 
swinging  in  a  wreath  of  flowers — all  of  'em  having 
mushy  messages  underneath;  and  me  having  to  send 
this  card  to  the  North  American  Cleaning  and  Dye 
Works,  which  is  run  by  Otto  Birdsall,  a  smirking  old 
widower,  that  uses  hair  oil  and  perfumery,  and  im 
agines  every  woman  in  town  is  mad  about  him. 

"The  mildest  card  I  could  find  was  covered  with 
red  and  purple  cauliflowers  or  something,  and  it  said 
in  silver  print:  'With  fondest  remembrance!'  Think 
of  that  going  through  the  Red  Gap  post-office  to  be 
read  by  old  Mis'  Terwilliger,  that  some  say  will  even 
open  letters  that  look  interesting — to  say  nothing  of 
its  going  to  this  fresh  old  Otto  Birdsall,  that  tried  to 
hold  my  hand  once  not  so  many  years  ago. 

"You  bet  I  made  the  written  part  strong  enough 
not  to  give  him  or  any  other  party  a  wrong  notion  of 
my  sentiments  toward  him.  At  that,  I  guess  Otto 


346          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

wouldn't  make  any  mistake  since  the  time  I  give  him 
hell  last  summer  for  putting  my  evening  gowns  in  his 
show  window  every  time  he'd  clean  one,  just  to  show 
off  his  work.  It  looked  so  kind  of  indelicate  seeing 
an  empty  dress  hung  up  there  that  every  soul  in 
town  knew  belonged  to  me. 

"What's  that?  Oh,  I  wrote  on  the  card  that  if 
this  stuff  of  mine  don't  come  up  on  the  next  stage  I'll 
be  right  down  there,  and  when  I'm  through  handling 
him  he'll  be  able  to  say  truthfully  that  he  ain't  got 
a  gray  hair  in  his  head.  I  guess  Otto  will  know  my 
intentions  are  honest,  in  spite  of  that  'fondest  re 
membrance.' 

"Then,  on  top  of  that,  I  had  a  run-in  with  the 
Swede  for  selling  his  rotten  whiskey  to  them  poor 
Injin  boys  that  had  a  fight  last  night  after  they  got 
tight  on  it.  The  Swede  laughs  and  says  nobody 
can  prove  he  sold  'em  a  drop,  and  I  says  that's 
probably  true.  I  says  it's  always  hard  to  prove 
things.  'For  instance,'  I  says,  'if  they's  another 
drop  of  liquor  sold  to  an  Injin  during  this  haying 
time,  and  a  couple  or  three  nights  after  that  your 
nasty  dump  here  is  set  fire  to  in  six  places,  and  some 
cowardly  assassin  out  in  the  brush  picks  you  off  with 
a  rifle  when  you  rush  out — it  will  be  mighty  hard 
to  prove  that  anybody  did  that,  too;  and  you  not 
caring  whether  it's  proved  or  not,  for  that  matter. 

'"In  fact,'  I  says,  'I  don't  suppose  anybody  would 
take  the  trouble  to  prove  it,  even  if  it  could  be  easy 
proved.  You'd  note  a  singular  lack  of  public  inter- 


"THE  SWEDE  BRISTLES  UP  ANI>  SAYS:  'THAT  SOUNDS  LIKE 
FIGHTING  TALK!  '     i  SAYS:  'YOUR  HEARING  is  PERFECT.'  " 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          347 

est  in  it — if  you  was  spared  to  us.  I  guess  about  as 
far  as  an  investigation  would  ever  get — the  coroner's 
jury  would  say  it  was  the  work  of  Pete's  brother-in- 
law;  and  you  know  what  that  would  mean.'  The 
Swede  bristles  up  and  says:  'That  sounds  like  fight 
ing  talk!'  I  says:  'Your  hearing  is  perfect.'  I  left 
him  thinking  hard." 

"Pete's  brother-in-law?  That  reminds  me,"  I 
said.  "Pete  was  telling  me  about  him  just — I  mean 
during  his  lunch  hour;  but  he  had  to  go  to  work  again 
just  at  the  beginning  of  something  that  sounded 
good — about  the  time  he  was  going  to  kill  a  bright 
lawyer.  What  was  that?" 

The  glass  was  drained  and  Ma  Pettengill  eyed 
the  inconsiderable  remains  of  the  ham  with  some 
thing  like  repugnance.  She  averted  her  face  from 
it,  lay  back  in  the  armchair  she  had  chosen,  and 
rolled  a  cigarette,  while  I  brought  a  hassock  for  the 
jewelled  slippers  and  the  scarlet  silken  ankles,  so 
ill-befitting  one  of  her  age.  The  cigarette  was  pres 
ently  burning. 

"I  guess  Pete's  b'other-in-law,  as  he  calls  him, 
won't  come  into  these  parts  again.  He  had  a  kind 
of  narrow  squeak  this  last  time.  Pete  done  some 
thing  pretty  raw,  even  for  this  liberal-minded  com 
munity.  He  got  scared  about  it  himself  and  left  the 
country  for  a  couple  of  months — looking  for  his 
brother-in-law,  he  said.  He  beat  it  up  North  and 
got  in  with  a  bunch  of  other  In j  ins  that  was  being 
took  down  to  New  York  City  to  advertise  a  railroad, 


348  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Pete  looking  like  what  folks  think  an  Injin  ought  to 
look  when  he's  dressed  for  the  part.  But  he  got 
homesick;  and,  anyway,  he  didn't  like  the  job. 

"This  passenger  agent  that  took  'em  East  put 
'em  up  at  one  of  the  big  hotels  all  right,  but  he 
subjects  'em  to  hardships  they  ain't  used  to.  He 
wouldn't  let  'em  talk  much  English,  except  to  say, 
'Ugh!  Ugh!' — like  In j ins  are  supposed  to — with  a 
few  remarks  about  the  Great  Spirit;  and  not  only 
that,  but  he  makes  'em  wear  blankets  and  paint  their 
faces — an  Injin  without  paint  and  blanket  and  some 
beadwork  seeming  to  a  general  passenger  agent 
like  a  state  capitol  without  a  dome.  And  on  top  of 
these  outrages  he  puts  it  up  with  the  press  agent  of 
this  big  hotel  to  have  the  poor  things  sleep  up  on  the 
roof,  right  in  the  open  air,  so  them  jay  New  York 
newspapers  would  fall  for  it  and  print  articles  about 
these  hardy  sons  of  the  forest,  the  last  of  a  vanishing 
race,  being  stifled  by  walls — with  the  names  of  the 
railroad  and  the  hotel  coming  out  good  and  strong 
all  through  the  piece. 

"Three  of  the  poor  things  got  pneumonia,  not 
being  used  to  such  exposure;  and  Pete  himself  took 
a  bad  cold,  and  got  mad  and  quit  the  job.  They 
find  him  a  couple  of  days  later,  in  a  check  suit  and 
white  shoes  and  a  golf  cap,  playing  pool  in  a  saloon 
over  on  Eighth  Avenue,  and  ship  him  back  as  a  dis 
grace  to  the  Far  West  and  a  great  common  carrier. 

"He  got  in  here  one  night,  me  being  his  best  friend, 
and  we  talked  it  over.  I  advised  him  to  go  down  and 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  349 

give  himself  up  and  have  it  over;  and  he  agreed,  and 
went  down  to  Red  Gap  the  next  day  in  his  new 
clothes  and  knocked  at  the  jail  door.  He  made  a 
long  talk  about  how  his  brother-in-law  was  the  man 
that  really  done  it,  and  he's  been  searching  for  him 
clear  over  to  the  rising  sun,  but  can't  find  him;  so 
he's  come  to  give  himself  up,  even  if  they  ain't  got 
the  least  grounds  to  suspect  him — and  can  he  have 
his  trial  for  murder  over  that  afternoon,  so  he  can 
come  back  up  here  the  next  day  and  go  to  work? 

"They  locked  him  up  and  Judge  Ballard  appointed 
J.  Waldo  Snyder  to  defend  him.  He  was  a  new  young 
lawyer  from  the  East  that  had  just  come  to  Red  Gap, 
highly  ambitious  and  full  of  devices  for  showing  that 
parties  couldn't  have  been  in  their  right  mind  when 
they  committed  the  deed — see  the  State  against 
Jamstucker,  New  York  Reports  Number  23,  pages 
19  to  78  inclusive. 

"Oh,  he  told  me  all  about  it  up  in  his  office  one  day 
— how  he  was  going  to  get  Pete  off.  Ain't  lawyers 
the  goods,  though!  And  doctors?  This  J.  W. 
Snyder  had  a  doctor  ready  to  swear  that  Pete  was 
nutty  when  he  fired  the  shot,  even  if  not  before  nor 
after.  When  I  was  a  kid  at  school,  back  in  Fredonia, 
New  York  State,  we  used  to  have  debates  about 
which  does  the  most  harm — fire  or  water?  Nowa 
days  I  bet  they'd  have :  Which  does  the  most  harm — 
doctors  or  lawyers?  Well,  anyway,  there  Pete  was 
in  jail " 

"Please  tell  in  your  own  simple  words  just  how  this 


350  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

trouble  began,"  I  broke  in.  "What  did  Pete  fire 
the  shot  for  and  who  stopped  it?  Now  then!" 

"What!  Don't  you  know  about  that?  Well, 
well!  So  you  never  heard  about  Pete  sending  this 
medicine  man  over  the  one-way  trail?  I'll  have  to 
tell  you,  then.  It  was  three  years  ago.  Pete  was 
camped  about  nine  miles  the  other  side  of  Kulanche, 
on  the  Corporation  Ranch,  and  his  little  year-old 
boy  was  took  badly  sick.  I  never  did  know  with 
what.  Diphtheria,  I  guess.  And  I  got  to  tell  you 
Pete  is  crazy  about  babies.  Always  has  been. 
Thirty  years  ago,  when  my  own  baby  hadn't  been 
but  a  few  weeks  born,  Lysander  John  had  to  be  in 
Red  Gap  with  a  smashed  leg  and  arm,  and  I  was  here 
alone  with  Pete  for  two  months  of  one  winter.  Say, 
he  was  better  than  any  trained  nurse  with  both  of  us, 
even  if  my  papoose  was  only  a  girl  one!  Folks  used 
to  wonder  afterward  if  I  hadn't  been  afraid  with  just 
Pete  round.  Good  lands!  If  they'd  ever  seen  him 
cuddle  that  mite  and  sing  songs  to  it  in  Injin  about 
the  rain  and  the  grass !  Anyway,  I  got  to  know  Pete 
so  well  that  winter  I  never  blamed  him  much  for 
what  come  off. 

"Well,  this  yearling  of  his  got  bad  and  Pete  was 
in  two  minds.  He  believed  in  white  doctors  with 
his  good  sense,  but  he  believed  in  Injin  doctors  with 
his  superstition,  which  was  older.  So  he  tried  to 
have  one  of  each.  There  was  an  old  rogue  of  a 
medicine  man  round  here  then  from  the  reservation 
up  north.  He'd  been  doing  a  little  work  at  haying 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  351 

on  the  Corporation,  but  he  was  getting  his  main  graft 
selling  the  In j  ins  charms  and  making  spells  over  their 
sick;  a  crafty  old  crook  playing  on  their  ignorance 
— understand?  And  Pete,  having  got  the  white  doc 
tor  from  Kulanche,  thought  he'd  cinch  matters  by 
getting  the  medicine  man,  too.  At  that,  I  guess  one 
would  of  been  about  as  useful  as  the  other,  the 
Kulanche  doctor  knowing  more  about  anthrax  and 
blackleg  than  he  did  about  sick  Injin  babies. 

"The  medicine  man  sees  right  off  how  scared  Pete 
is  for  his  kid  and  thinks  here's  a  chance  to  make  some 
big  money.  He  looks  at  the  little  patient  and  says 
yes,  he  can  cure  him,  sure;  but  it'll  be  a  hard  job  and 
he  can't  undertake  it  unless  Pete  comes  through 
with  forty  dollars  and  his  span  of  mules.  But 
Pete  ain't  got  forty  dollars  or  forty  cents,  and  the 
Kulanche  doctor  has  got  to  the  mules  already,  having 
a  lien  on  'em  for  twenty-five. 

"Pete  hurried  over  and  put  the  proposition  up  to 
me.  He  says  his  little  chief  is  badly  sick  and  he's 
got  a  fine  white  doctor,  but  will  I  stake  him  to 
enough  to  get  this  fine  Injin  doctor? — thus  making  a 
cure  certain.  Well,  I  tore  into  the  old  fool  for  want 
ing  to  let  this  depraved  old  medicine  man  tamper 
with  his  baby,  and  I  warned  him  the  Kulanche  doctor 
probably  wasn't  much  better.  Then  I  tell  him  he's 
to  send  down  for  the  best  doctor  in  Red  Gap  at  my 
expense  and  keep  him  with  the  child  till  it's  well. 
I  tell  him  he  can  have  the  whole  ranch  if  it  would  cure 
his  child,  but  not  one  cent  for  the  Injin. 


352          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"Well,  the  poor  boy  is  about  half  convinced  I'm 
right,  but  he's  been  an  Injin  too  long  to  believe  it  all 
through.  He  went  off  and  sent  for  the  Red  Gap 
doctor,  but  he  can't  resist  making  another  try  for  the 
Injin  one;  and  that  old  scoundrel  holds  out  for  his 
price.  Pete  wants  him  to  wait  for  his  pay  till  haying 
is  over;  but  he  won't  because  he  thinks  Pete  can  get 
the  money  from  me  now  if  he  really  has  to  have  it. 
Pete  must  of  been  crazy  for  fair  about  that  time. 

"  'All  right,'  says  he;  'you  can  cure  my  little  chief?' 

"The  crook  says  he  can  if  the  money  is  in  his  hand. 

"  'All  right,'  says  Pete  again;  'but  if  my  little  chief 
dies  something  bad  is  going  to  happen  to  you.' 

"That's  about  all  they  ever  found  out  concerning 
this  threat  of  Pete's,  though  another  Injin  who  heard 
it  said  that  Pete  said  his  brother-in-law  would  make 
the  trouble — not  Pete  himself.  Which  was  likely 
true  enough. 

"Pete's  little  chief  died  the  night  the  Red  Gap 
doctor  got  up  here.  Ten  minutes  later  this  medicine 
man  had  hitched  up  his  team,  loaded  his  plunder  into 
a  wagon,  and  was  pouring  leather  into  his  horses  to 
get  back  home  quick.  He  knew  Pete  never  talks 
just  to  hear  himself  talk.  They  found  him  about 
thirty  miles  on  his  way — slumped  down  in  the  wagon 
bed,  his  team  hitched  by  the  roadside.  There  had 
been  just  one  careful  shot.  As  he  hadn't  been 
robbed — he  had  over  a  hundred  dollars  in  gold  on 
him — it  pointed  a  mite  too  strong  at  Pete  after  his 
threat. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          353 

"A  deputy  sheriff  come  up.  Pete  said  his  brother- 
in-law  had  been  hanging  round  lately  and  had  talked 
very  dangerous  about  the  medicine  man.  He  said 
the  brother-in-law  had  probably  done  the  job.  But 
Pete  had  pulled  this  too  often  before  when  in  diffi 
culties.  The  deputy  said  he'd  better  come  along 
down  to  Red  Gap  and  tell  the  district  attorney  about 
it.  Pete  said  all  right  and  crawled  into  his  tepee 
for  his  coat  and  hat — crawled  right  on  out  the  back 
and  into  the  brush  while  the  deputy  rolled  a  cigarette. 

"That  was  when  he  joined  this  bunch  of  noble 
redmen  to  advertise  the  vanishing  romance  of  the 
Great  West — being  helped  out  of  the  country,  I 
shouldn't  wonder,  by  some  lawless  old  hound  that 
had  feelings  for  him  and  showed  it  when  he  come 
along  in  the  night  to  the  ranch  where  he'd  nursed 
her  and  her  baby.  They  looked  for  him  a  little 
while,  then  dropped  it;  in  fact,  everybody  was  kind 
of  glad  he'd  got  off  and  kind  of  satisfied  that  he'd 
put  this  bad  Injin,  with  his  skull-duggery,  over  the 
big  jump. 

"Then  he  got  homesick,  like  I  told  you,  and  showed 
up  here  at  the  door;  and  I  saw  it  was  better  for  him 
to  give  himself  up  and  get  out  of  it  by  fan-  and  legal 
means.  Now!  You  got  it  straight  that  far?" 

I  nodded. 

"So  Pete  took  my  advice,  and  a  couple  days  later 
I  hurried  down  to  Red  Gap  and  had  a  talk  with 
Judge  Ballard  and  the  district  attorney.  The  judge 
said  it  had  been  embarrassing  to  justice  to  have  my 


354  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

old  Injin  walk  in  on  'em,  because  every  one  knew  he 
was  guilty.  Why  couldn't  he  of  stayed  up  here  where 
the  keen-eyed  officers  of  the  law  could  of  pretended 
not  to  know  he  was?  And  the  old  fool  was  only  mak 
ing  things  worse  with  his  everlasting  chatter  about 
his  brother-in-law,  every  one  knowing  there  wasn't 
such  a  person  in  existence — old  Pete  having  had 
dozens  of  every  kind  of  relation  in  the  world  but  a 
brother-in-law.  But  they're  going  to  have  this 
bright  young  lawyer  defend  him,  and  they  have 
hopes. 

"Then  I  talked  some.  I  said  it  was  true  that  every 
body  knew  Pete  bumped  off  this  old  crook  that  had  it 
coming  to  him,  but  they  could  never  prove  it,  because 
Pete  had  come  to  my  place  and  set  up  with  me  all 
night,  when  I  had  lumbago  or  something,  the  very 
night  this  crime  was  done  thirty-odd  miles  distant 
by  some  person  or  persons  unknown — except  it  could 
be  known  they  had  good  taste  about  who  needed 
killing. 

"At  this  Judge  Ballard  jumps  up  and  calls  me  an 
old  liar  and  shook  hands  warmly  with  me;  and  Gale 
Jordan,  that  was  district  attorney  then,  says  if  Mrs. 
Pettengill  will  give  him  her  word  of  honour  to  go  on 
the  witness  stand  and  perjure  herself  to  this  effect 
then  he  don't  see  no  use  of  even  putting  Kulanche 
County,  State  of  Washington,  to  the  expense  of  a 
trial,  the  said  county  already  being  deep  in  the  hole 
for  its  new  courthouse — but  for  mercy's  sake  to  stop 
the  old  idiot  babbling  about  his  brother-in-law,  that 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          355 

every  one  knows  he  never  had  one,  because  such  a  joke 
is  too  great  an  affront  to  the  dignity  of  the  law  in  such 
cases  made  and  provided — to  wit:  tell  the  old  fool  to 
say  nothing  except  'No,  he  never  done  it.'  And  he 
shakes  hands  with  me,  too,  and  says  he'll  have  an 
important  talk  with  Myron  Bughalter,  the  sheriff. 

"I  says  that's  the  best  way  out  of  it,  being  myself 
a  heavy  taxpayer;  and  I  go  see  this  Snyder  lawyer, 
and  then  over  to  the  jail  and  get  into  Pete's  cell, 
where  he's  having  a  high  old  time  with  a  sack  of  pep 
permint  candy  and  a  copy  of  the  Scientific  American. 
I  tell  him  to  cut  out  the  brother-in-law  stuff  and  just 
say  'No'  to  any  question  whatever.  He  said  he  would, 
and  I  went  off  home  to  rest  up  after  my  hard  ride. 

"Judge  Ballard  calls  that  night  and  says  every 
thing  is  fixed.  No  use  putting  the  county  to  the 
expense  of  a  trial  when  Pete  has  such  a  classy  per 
jured  alibi  as  I  would  give  him.  Myron  Bughalter 
is  to  go  out  of  the  jail  in  a  careless  manner  at  nine- 
thirty  that  night,  leaving  all  cells  unlocked  and  the 
door  wide  open  so  Pete  can  make  his  escape  without 
doing  any  damage  to  the  new  building.  It  seems  the 
only  other  prisoner  is  old  Sing  Wah,  that  they're 
willing  to  save  money  on,  too.  He'd  got  full  of  per 
fumed  port  and  raw  gin  a  few  nights  before,  an 
nounced  himself  as  a  prize-hatchet  man,  and  started 
a  tong  war  in  the  laundry  of  one  of  his  cousins. 
But  Sing  was  sober  now  and  would  stay  so  until  the 
next  New  Year's;  so  they  was  going  to  let  him  walk 
out  with  Pete.  The  judge  said  Pete  would  probably 


356  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

be  at  the  Arrowhead  by  sunup,  and  if  he'd  behave 
himself  from  now  on  the  law  would  let  bygones  be 
bygones.  I  thanked  the  judge  and  went  to  bed  feel 
ing  easy  about  old  Pete. 

"But  at  seven  the  next  morning  I'm  waked  up  by 
the  telephone — wanted  down  to  the  jail  in  a  hurry. 
I  go  there  soon  as  I  can  get  a  drink  of  hot  coffee  and 
find  that  poor  Myron  Bughalter  is  having  his  troubles. 
He'd  got  there  at  seven,  thinking,  of  course,  to  find 
both  his  prisoners  gone;  and  here  in  the  corridor  is 
Pete  setting  on  the  chest  of  Sing  Wah,  where  he'd 
been  all  night,  I  guess!  He  tells  Myron  he's  a  fool 
sheriff  to  leave  his  door  wide  open  that  way,  because 
this  bad  Chinaman  tried  to  walk  out  as  soon  as  he'd 
gone,  and  would  of  done  so  it  Pete  hadn't  jumped  him. 

"It  leaves  Myron  plenty  embarrassed,  but  he  fin 
ally  says  to  Pete  he  can  go  free,  anyway,  now,  for 
being  such  an  honest  jailbird;  and  old  Sing  Wah  can 
go,  too,  having  been  punished  enough  by  Pete's 
handling.  Sing  Wah  slides  out  quickly  enough  at 
this,  promising  to  send  Myron  a  dozen  silk  hand 
kerchiefs  and  a  pound  of  tea.  But  not  Pete.  No, 
sir!  He  tells  Myron  he's  give  himself  up  to  be  tried, 
and  he  wants  that  trial  and  won't  budge  till  he  gets 
it. 

"Then  Myron  telephoned  for  the  judge  and  the 
district  attorney,  and  for  me.  We  get  there  and  tell 
Pete  to  beat  it  quick.  But  the  old  mule  isn't  going 
to  move  one  step  without  that  trial.  He's  fled  back 
to  his  cell  and  stands  there  as  dignified  as  if  he  was 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  357 

going  to  lay  a  cornerstone.  He's  a  grave  rebuke  to 
the  whole  situation,  as  you  might  say.  Then  the 
Judge  and  Cale  go  through  some  kind  of  a  hocus- 
pocus  talk,  winding  up  with  both  of  them  saying 
'Not  guilty!'  in  a  loud  voice;  and  Myron  says  to 
Pete:  There!  You  had  your  trial;  now  get  out  of 
my  jail  this  minute.' 

"But  canny  old  Pete  is  still  balking.  He  says 
you  can't  have  a  trial  except  in  the  courthouse,  which 
is  upstairs,  and  they're  trying  to  cheat  a  poor  old 
Injin.  He's  talking  loud  by  this  time,  and  Judge 
Ballard  says,  all  right,  they  must  humour  the  poor 
child  of  Nature.  So  Myron  takes  Pete  by  the  wrist 
in  a  firm  manner — though  Pete's  insisting  he  ought 
to  have  the  silver  handcuffs  on  him — and  marches 
him  out  the  jail  door,  round  to  the  front  marble 
steps  of  the  new  courthouse,  up  the  steps,  down  the 
marble  hall  and  into  the  courtroom,  with  the  judge 
and  Cale  Jordan  and  me  marching  behind. 

"We  ain't  the  whole  procession,  either.  Out  in 
front  of  the  jail  was  about  fifteen  of  Pete's  friends 
and  relatives,  male  and  female,  that  had  been  hang 
ing  round  for  two  days  waiting  to  attend  his  coming- 
out  party.  Mebbe  that's  why  Pete  had  been  so 
strong  for  the  real  courthouse,  wanting  to  give  these 
friends  something  swell  for  then'  trouble.  Anyway, 
these  In j ins  fall  in  behind  us  when  we  come  out  and 
march  up  into  the  courtroom,  where  they  set  down 
in  great  ecstasy.  Every  last  one  of  'em  has  a  sack 
of  peppermint  candy  and  a  bag  of  popcorn  or  peanuts, 


358  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

and  they  all  begin  to  eat  busily.  The  steam  heat 
had  been  turned  on  and  that  hall  of  justice  in  three 
minutes  smelt  like  a  cheap  orphan  asylum  on  Christ 
mas  morning. 

"Then,  before  they  can  put  up  another  bluff  at 
giving  Pete  his  trial,with  Judge  Ballard  setting  up  in 
his  chair  with  his  specs  on  and  looking  fierce,  who 
rushes  in  but  this  J.  Waldo  person  that  is  Pete's  law 
yer.  He's  seen  the  procession  from  across  the  street 
and  fears  some  low-down  trick  is  being  played  on  his 
defenseless  client. 

"He  comes  storming  down  the  aisle  exclaiming: 
'Your  Honour,  I  protest  against  this  grossly  irregular 
proceeding!'  The  judge  pounds  on  his  desk  with  his 
little  croquet  mallet  and  Myron  Bughalter  tells 
Snyder,  out  of  the  corner  of  his  mouth,  to  shut  up. 
But  he  won't  shut  up  for  some  minutes.  This  is 
the  first  case  he'd  had  and  he's  probably  looked 
forward  to  a  grand  speech  to  the  jury  that  would 
make  'em  all  blubber  and  acquit  Pete  without 
leaving  the  box,  on  the  grounds  of  emotional  or  er 
ratic  insanity — or  whatever  it  is  that  murderers 
get  let  off  on  when  their  folks  are  well  fixed.  He 
sputters  quite  a  lot  about  this  monstrous  travesty 
on  justice  before  they  can  drill  the  real  facts  into  his 
head;  and  even  then  he  keeps  coming  back  to  Pete's 
being  crazy. 

"Then  Pete,  who  hears  this  view  of  his  case  for  the 
first  time,  begins  to  glare  at  his  lawyer  in  a  very 
nasty  way  and  starts  to  interrupt;  so  the  judge  has 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  359 

to  knock  wood  some  more  to  get  'em  all  quiet.  When 
they  do  get  still — with  Pete  looking  blacker  than  ever 
at  his  lawyer — Gale  Jordan  says:  Tete,  did  you  do 
this  killing?'  Pete  started  to  say  mebbe  his  brother- 
in-law  did,  but  caught  himself  in  time  and  said  'No !' 
at  the  same  time  starting  for  J.  Waldo,  that  had 
called  him  crazy.  Myron  Bughalter  shoves  him 
back  in  his  chair,  and  Gale  Jordan  says:  'Your 
Honour,  you  have  heard  the  evidence,  which  is  con 
clusive.  I  now  ask  that  the  prisoner  at  the  bar  be 
released/  Judge  Ballard  frowns  at  Pete  very  stern 
and  says:  'The  motion  is  granted.  Turn  him  loose, 
quick,  and  get  the  rest  of  that  smelly  bunch  out  of 
here  and  give  the  place  a  good  airing.  I  have  to 
hold  court  here  at  ten  o'clock.' 

"Pete  was  kind  of  convinced  now  that  he'd  had 
a  sure-enough  trial,  and  his  friends  had  seen  the 
marble  walls  and  red  carpet  and  varnished  furniture, 
and  everything;  so  he  consented  to  be  set  free — not 
in  any  rush,  but  like  he  was  willing  to  do  'em  a  favour. 

"And  all  the  time  he's  keeping  a  bad  little  eye  on 
J.  Waldo.  The  minute  he  gets  down  from  the 
stand  he  makes  for  him  and  says  what  does  he  mean 
by  saying  he  was  crazy  when  he  done  this  killing? 
J.  Waldo  tries  to  explain  that  this  was  his  only  de 
fense  and  was  going  on  to  tell  what  an  elegant  de 
fense  it  was;  but  Pete  gets  madder  and  madder.  I 
guess  he'd  been  called  everything  in  the  world  be 
fore,  but  never  crazy;  that's  the  very  worst  thing 
you  can  tell  an  Injin. 


360          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"They  work  out  toward  the  front  door;  and  then 
I  hear  Pete  say:  'You  know  what?  You  said  I'm 
crazy.  My  b'other-in-law's  going  to  make  some 
thing  happen  to  you  in  the  night.'  Pete  was  seeing 
red  by  that  time.  The  judge  tells  Myron  to  hurry 
and  get  the  room  cleared  and  open  some  windows. 
Myron  didn't  have  to  clear  it  of  J.  W.  Snyder.  That 
bright  young  lawyer  dashed  out  and  was  fifty  feet 
ahead  of  the  bunch  when  they  got  to  the  front  door. 

"So  Pete  was  a  free  man  once  more,  without  a 
stain  on  his  character  except  to  them  that  knew  him 
well.  But  the  old  fool  had  lost  me  a  tenant.  Yes, 
sir;  this  J.  W.  Snyder  young  man,  with  the  sign 
hardly  dry  on  the  glass  door  of  his  office  in  the  Pet- 
tengill  Block,  had  a  nervous  temperament  to  start 
with,  and  on  top  of  that  he'd  gone  fully  into  Pete's 
life  history  and  found  out  that  parties  his  brother- 
in-law  was  displeased  with  didn't  thrive  long.  He 
packed  up  his  law  library  that  afternoon  and  left 
for  another  town  that  night. 

"Yes,  Pete's  a  wonder!  Watch  him  slaving  away 
out  there.  And  he  must  of  been  working  hard  all 
day,  even  with  me  not  here  to  keep  tabs  on  him. 
Just  look  at  the  size  of  that  pile  of  wood  he's  done 
up,  when  he  might  easy  of  been  loafing  on  the  job!" 


IX 
LITTLE  OLD  NEW  YORK 

MONDAY'S  mail  for  the  Arrowhead  was 
brought  in  by  the  Chinaman  while  Ma 
Pettengill  and  I  loitered  to  the  close  of  the 
evening  meal:  a  canvas  sack  of  letters  and  newspapers 
with  three  bulky  packages  of  merchandise  that  had 
come  by  parcels  post.  The  latter  evoked  a  passing 
storm  from  my  hostess.  Hadn't  she  warned  folks 
time  and  again  to  send  all  her  stuff  by  express  instead 
of  by  parcels  post,  which  would  sure  get  her  gunned 
some  day  by  the  stage  driver  who  got  nothing  extra 
for  hauling  such  matter?  She  had  so! 

We  trifled  now  with  a  fruity  desert  and  the  lady 
regaled  me  with  a  brief  exposure  of  our  great  parcels- 
post  system  as  a  piece  of  the  nerviest  penny  pinching 
she  had  ever  known  our  Government  guilty  of.  Be 
cause  why?  Because  these  here  poor  R.  F.  D.  stage 
drivers  had  to  do  the  extra  hauling  for  nothing. 

"Here's  old  Harvey  Step  toe  with  the  mail  contract 
for  sixty  dollars  a  month,  three  trips  a  week  between 
Red  Gap  and  Surprise  Valley,  forty-five  miles  each 
way,  barely  making  enough  extra  on  express  matter 
and  local  freight  to  come  out  even  after  buying 
horse-feed.  Then  comes  parcels  post,  and  parties 

861 


362  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

that  had  had  to  pay  him  four  bits  or  a  dollar  for  a 
large  package,  or  two  bits  for  a  small  one,  can  have 
'em  brought  in  by  mail  for  nothing.  Of  course 
most  of  us  eased  up  on  him  after  we  understood  the 
hellish  injustice  of  it.  We  took  pains  not  to  have 
things  sent  parcels  post  and  when  they  come  unbe 
known  to  us,  like  these  here  to-night,  we'd  always  pay 
him  anyway,  just  like  they  was  express.  It  was  only 
fair  and,  besides,  we  would  live  longer,  Harvey  Step- 
toe  being  morose  and  sudden. 

"Like  when  old  Safety  First  Timmins  got  the  idea 
he  could  have  all  his  supplies  sent  from  Red  Gap  for 
almost  nothing  by  putting  stamps  on  'em.  He  was 
tickled  to  death  with  the  notion  until,  after  the  sec 
ond  load  of  about  a  hundred  pounds,  some  cowardly 
assassin  shot  at  him  from  the  brush  one  morning 
about  the  time  the  stage  usually  went  down  past 
his  ranch.  The  charge  missed  him  by  about  four 
inches  and  went  into  the  barn  door.  He  dug  it  out 
and  found  a  bullet  and  two  buckshot.  Old  Safety 
First  ain't  any  Sherlock  Holmes,  but  even  Doctor 
Watson  could  of  solved  this  murderous  crime.  When 
Harvey  come  by  the  next  night  he  went  out  and  says 
to  him,  *  Ain't  you  got  one  of  them  old  Mississippi 
Yaegers  about  seventy-five  years  old  that  carries  a 
bullet  and  two  buckshot?'  Harvey  thought  back 
earnestly  for  a  minute,  then  says,  'Not  now  I  ain't. 
I  used  to  have  one  of  them  old  hairlooms  around  the 
house  but  I  found  they  ain't  reliable  when  you  want 
to  do  fine  work  from  a  safe  distance;  so  I  threw  her 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          363 

away  yesterday  morning  and  got  me  this  nice  new 
30-30  down  to  Goshook  &  Dale's  hardware  store.' 

"He  pulled  the  new  gun  out  and  patted  it  tenderly 
in  the  sight  of  old  Timmins.  'Ain't  it  a  cunning 
little  implement?'  he  says;  'I  tried  it  out  coming  up 
this  afternoon.  I  could  split  a  hair  with  it  as  far, 
say,  as  from  that  clump  of  buck-brush  over  to  your 
barn.  And  by  the  way,  Mr.  Timmins,'  he  says,  'I 
got  some  more  stuff  for  you  here  from  the  Square 
Deal  Grocery — stuff  all  gummed  up  with  postage 
stamps.'  He  leans  his  new  toy  against  the  seat 
and  dumps  out  a  sack  of  flour  and  a  sack  of  dried 
fruit  and  one  or  two  other  things.  'This  parcels 
post  is  a  grand  thing,  ain't  it? '  says  he. 

"'Well — yes  and  no,  now  that  you  speak  of  it/ 
says  old  Safety  First.  'The  fact  is  I'm  kind  of 
prejudiced  against  it;  I  ain't  going  to  have  things 
come  to  me  any  more  all  stuck  over  with  them 
trifling  little  postage  stamps.  It  don't  look  digni 
fied/  'No?'  says  Harvey.  'No/  says  Safety  First 
in  a  firm  tone.  'I  won't  ever  have  another  single 
thing  come  by  mail  if  I  can  help  it/  'I  bet  you're 
superstitious/  says  Harvey,  climbing  back  to  his 
seat  and  petting  the  new  gun  again.  'I  bet  you're  so 
superstitious  you'd  take  this  here  shiny  new  imple 
ment  off  my  hands  at  cost  if  I  hinted  I'd  part  with 
it.'  'I  almost  believe  I  would/  says  Safety  First. 
'Well,  it  don't  seem  like  I'd  have  much  use  for  it  after 
all/  says  Harvey.  'Of  course  I  can  always  get  a 
new  one  if  my  fancy  happens  to  run  that  way  again/ 


364          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

"So  old  Safety  First  buys  a  new  loaded  rifle  that 
he  ain't  got  a  use  on  earth  for.  It  would  of  looked 
to  outsiders  like  he  was  throwing  his  money  away  on 
fripperies,  but  he  knew  it  was  a  prime  necessity  of 
life  all  right.  The  parcels  post  ain't  done  him  a  bit 
of  good  since,  though  I  send  him  marked  pieces  in 
the  papers  every  now  and  then  telling  how  the  post 
master  general  thinks  it's  a  great  boon  to  the  ulti 
mate  consumer.  And  I  mustn't  forget  to  send 
Harvey  six  bits  for  them  three  packages  that  come 
to-night.  That's  what  we  do.  Otherwise,  him  being 
morose  and  turbulent,  he'd  get  a  new  gun  and  make 
ultimate  consumers  out  of  all  of  us.  Darned  ulti 
mate!  I  reckon  we  got  a  glorious  Government,  like 
candidates  always  tell  us,  but  a  postmaster  general 
that  expected  stage  drivers  to  do  three  times  the 
hauling  they  had  been  doing  with  no  extra  pay 
wouldn't  last  long  out  at  the  tail  of  an  R.  F.  D.  route. 
There'd  be  pieces  in  the  paper  telling  about  how  he 
rose  to  prominence  from  the  time  he  got  a  lot  of  dele 
gates  sewed  up  for  the  people's  choice  and  how  his 
place  will  be  hard  to  fill.  It  certainly  would  be  hard 
to  fill  out  here.  Old  Timmins,  for  one,  would  turn 
a  deaf  ear  to  his  country's  call." 

Lew  Wee  having  now  cleared  the  table  of  all  but 
coffee,  we  lingered  for  a  leisurely  overhauling  of  the 
mail  sack.  Ma  Pettengill  slit  envelopes  and  read 
letters  to  an  accompanying  rumble  of  protest.  She 
several  times  wished  to  know  what  certain  parties 
took  her  for — and  they'd  be  fooled  if  they  did;  and 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  365 

now  and  again  she  dwelt  upon  the  insoluble  mystery 
of  her  not  being  in  the  poorhouse  at  that  moment; 
yes,  and  she'd  of  been  there  long  ago  if  she  had  let 
these  parties  run  her  business  like  they  thought  they 
could.  But  what  could  a  lone  defenceless  woman 
expect?  She'd  show  them,  though!  Been  showing 
'em  for  thirty  years  now,  and  still  had  her  health, 
hadn't  she? 

Letters  and  bills  were  at  last  neatly  stacked  and 
the  poor  weak  woman  fell  upon  the  newspapers. 
The  Red  Gap  Recorder  was  shorn  of  its  wrapper. 
Being  first  a  woman  she  turned  to  the  fourth  page  to 
flash  a  practised  eye  over  that  department  which  is 
headed  "Life's  Stages— At  the  Altar— In  the  Cra 
dle! — To  the  Tomb."  Having  gleaned  recent  vital 
statistics  she  turned  next  to  the  column  carrying 
the  market  quotations  on  beef  cattle,  for  after  being 
a  woman  she  is  a  rancher.  Prices  for  that  day  must 
have  pleased  her  immensely  for  she  grudgingly 
mumbled  that  they  were  less  ruinous  than  she  had 
expected.  In  the  elation  of  which  this  admission 
was  a  sign  she  next  refreshed  me  with  various  per 
sonal  items  from  a  column  headed  "Social  Glean 
ings — by  Madame  On  Dit." 

I  learned  that  at  the  last  regular  meeting  of  the 
Ladies'  Friday  Afternoon  Shakespeare  Club,  Mrs. 
Dr.  Percy  Hailey  Martingale  had  read  a  paper  en 
titled  "My  Trip  to  the  Panama-Pacific  Exposition," 
after  which  a  dainty  collation  was  served  by  mine 
hostess  Mrs.  Judge  Ballard;  that  Miss  Beryl  Mae 


366  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Macomber,  the  well-known  young  society  heiress, 
was  visiting  friends  in  Spokane  where  rumour  hath  it 
that  she  would  take  a  course  of  lessons  in  elocu 
tion;  and  that  Mrs.  Cora  Hartwick  Wales,  prominent 
society  matron  and  leader  of  the  ultra  smart  set  of 
Price's  Addition,  had  on  Thursday  afternoon  at  her 
charming  new  bungalow,  corner  of  Bella  Vista  Street 
and  Prospect  Avenue,  entertained  a  number  of  her 
inmates  at  tea.  Ma  Pettengill  and  I  here  quickly 
agreed  that  the  proofreading  on  the  Recorder  was 
not  all  it  should  be.  Then  she  unctuously  read  me  a 
longer  item  from  another  column  which  was  signed 
"The  Lounger  in  the  Lobby" : 

"  Mr.  Benjamin  P.  Sutton,  the  wealthy  capitalist 
of  Nome,  Alaska,  and  a  prince  of  good  fellows,  is 
again  in  our  midst  for  his  annual  visit  to  His  Honour 
Alonzo  Price,  Red  Gap's  present  mayor,  of  whom  he 
is  an  old-time  friend  and  associate.  Mr.  Sutton, 
who  is  the  picture  of  health,  brings  glowing  reports 
from  the  North  and  is  firm  in  his  belief  that  Alaska 
will  at  no  distant  day  become  the  garden  spot  of  the 
world.  In  the  course  of  a  brief  interview  he  confided 
to  ye  scribe  that  on  his  present  trip  to  the  outside  he 
would  not  again  revisit  his  birthplace,  the  city  of 
New  York,  as  he  did  last  year.  'Once  was  enough, 
for  many  reasons,'  said  Mr.  Sutton  grimly.  '  They 
call  it  "Little  old  New  York,"  but  it  isn't  little  and  it 
isn't  old.  It's  big  and  it's  new — we  have  older 
buildings  right  in  Nome  than  any  you  can  find  on 
Broadway.  Since  my  brief  sojourn  there  last  year 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          367 

I  have  decided  that  our  people  before  going  to  New 
York  should  see  America  first.' ' 

"Now  what  do  you  think  of  that?"  demanded  the 
lady.  I  said  I  would  be  able  to  think  little  of  it  un 
less  I  were  told  the  precise  reasons  for  this  rather 
brutal  abuse  of  a  great  city.  What,  indeed,  were 
the  "many  reasons"  that  Mr.  Sutton  had  grimly 
not  confided  to  ye  scribe? 

Ma  Pettengill  chuckled  and  reread  parts  of  the 
indictment.  Thereafter  she  again  chuckled  fluently 
and  uttered  broken  phrases  to  herself.  "Horse- 
car"  was  one;  "the  only  born  New  Yorker  alive" 
was  another.  It  became  necessary  for  me  to  remind 
the  woman  that  a  guest  was  present.  I  did  this  by 
shifting  my  chair  to  face  the  stone  fireplace  in  which 
a  pine  chunk  glowed,  and  by  coughing  in  a  delicate 
and  expectant  manner. 

"Poor  Ben!"  she  murmured — "going  all  the  day 
down  there  just  to  get  one  romantic  look  at  his  old 
home  after  being  gone  twenty-five  years.  I  don't 
blame  him  for  talking  rough  about  the  town,  nor  for 
his  criminal  act — stealing  a  street-car  track." 

It  sounded  piquant — a  noble  theft  indeed!  I  now 
murmured  a  bit  myself,  striving  to  convey  an  active 
incredulity  that  yet  might  be  vanquished  by  facts. 
The  lady  quite  ignored  this,  diverging  to  her  own 
opinion  of  New  York.  She  tore  the  wrapper  from  a 
Sunday  issue  of  a  famous  metropolitan  daily  and 
flaunted  its  comic  supplement  at  me.  "That's 
how  I  always  think  of  New  York,"  said  she — "a  kind 


368          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

of  a  comic  supplement  to  the  rest  of  this  great  coun 
try.  Here — see  these  two  comical  little  tots  stand 
ing  on  their  uncle's  stomach  and  chopping  his  heart 
out  with  their  axes — after  you  got  the  town  sized 
up  it's  just  that  funny  and  horrible.  It's  like  the 
music  I  heard  that  time  at  a  higher  concert  I  was 
drug  to  in  Boston — ingenious  but  unpleasant." 

But  this  was  not  what  I  would  sit  up  for  after  a 
hard  day's  fishing — this  coarse  disparagement  of 
something  the  poor  creature  was  unfitted  to  compre 
hend. 

"Ben  Sutton,"  I  remarked  firmly. 

"The  inhabitants  of  New  York  are  divided  fifty- 
fifty  between  them  that  are  trying  to  get  what  you 
got  and  them  that  think  you're  trying  to  get  what 
they  got." 

"Ben  Sutton,"  I  repeated,  trying  to  make  it  sullen. 

"Ask  a  man  on  the  street  in  New  York  where  such 
and  such  a  building  is  and  he'll  edge  out  of  reaching 
distance,  with  his  hand  on  his  watch,  before  he  tells 
you  he  don't  know.  In  Denver,  or  San  Francisco 
now,  the  man  will  most  likely  walk  a  block  or  two 
with  you  just  to  make  sure  you  get  the  directions 
right." 

"Ben  Sutton!" 

"They'll  fall  for  raw  stun7,  though.  I  know  a  slick 
mining  promoter  from  Arizona  that  stops  at  the  big 
gest  hotel  on  Fifth  Avenue  and  has  himself  paged  by 
the  boys  about  twenty  times  a  day  so  folks  will  know 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  369 

how  important  he  is.  He'll  get  up  from  his  table  in 
the  restaurant  and  follow  the  boy  out  in  a  way  to 
make  'em  think  that  nine  million  dollars  is  at  stake. 
He  tells  me  it  helps  him  a  lot  in  landing  the  wise 


ones." 


"Stole  a  street-car  track,"  I  muttered  desperately. 

"The  typical  New  Yorker,  like  they  call  him,  was 
born  in  Haverhill,  Massachusetts,  and  sleeps  in  New 
Rochelle,  going  in  on  the  8:12  and  coming  out  on 
the " 

"I  had  a  pretty  fight  landing  that  biggest  one  this 
afternoon,  from  that  pool  under  the  falls  up  above  the 
big  bend.  Twice  I  thought  I'd  lost  him,  but  he  was 
only  hiding — and  then  I  found  I'd  forgotten  my  land 
ing  net.  Say,  did  I  ever  tell  you  about  the  time  I 
was  fishing  for  steel  head  down  in  Oregon,  and  the 

bear "  The  lady  hereupon  raised  a  hushing 

hand. 

Well,  as  I  was  saying,  Ben  Sutton  blew  into  town 
early  last  September  and  after  shaking  hands  with  his 
old  confederate,  Lon  Price,  he  says  how  is  the  good 
wife  and  is  she  at  home  and  Lon  says  no;  that  Petti- 
kins  has  been  up  at  Silver  Springs  resting  for  a  couple 
weeks;  so  Ben  says  it's  too  bad  he'll  miss  the  little 
lady,  as  in  that  case  he  has  something  good  to  suggest, 
which  is,  what's  the  matter  with  him  and  Lon  taking 
a  swift  hike  down  to  New  York  which  Ben  ain't  seen 
since  1892,  though  he  was  born  there,  and  he'd  now 
like  to  have  a  look  at  the  old  home  in  Lon's  company. 


370          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Lon  says  it's  too  bad  Pettikins  ain't  there  to  go  along, 
but  if  they  start  at  once  she  wouldn't  have  time  to 
join  them,  and  Ben  says  he  can  start  near  enough  at 
once  for  that,  so  hurry  and  pack  the  suitcase.  Lon 
does  it,  leaving  a  delayed  telegram  to  Henrietta  to  be 
sent  after  they  start,  begging  her  to  join  them  if  not 
too  late,  which  it  would  be. 

While  they  are  in  Louis  Meyer's  Place  feeling 
good  over  this  coop,  in  comes  the  ever  care-free  Jeff 
Tuttle  and  Jeff  says  he  wouldn't  mind  going  out  on 
rodeo  himself  with  'em,  at  least  as  far  as  Jersey  City 
where  he  has  a  dear  old  aunt  living — or  she  did  live 
there  when  he  was  a  little  boy  and  was  always  very 
nice  to  him  and  he  ain't  done  right  in  not  going  to  see 
her  for  thirty  years — and  if  he's  that  close  to  the  big 
town  he  could  run  over  from  Jersey  City  for  a  look — 
see. 

Lon  and  Ben  hail  his  generous  decision  with  cheers 
and  on  the  way  to  another  place  they  meet  me,  just 
down  from  the  ranch.  And  why  don't  I  come  along 
with  the  bunch?  Ben  has  it  all  fixed  in  ten  seconds, 
he  being  one  of  these  talkers  that  will  odd  things  along 
till  they  sound  even,  and  the  other  two  chiming  in 
with  him  and  wanting  to  buy  my  ticket  right  then. 
But  I  hesitated  some.  Lon  and  Ben  Sutton  was  all 
right  to  go  with,  but  Jeff  Tuttle  was  a  different  kittle 
of  fish.  Jeff  is  a  decent  man  in  many  respects  and 
seems  real  refined  when  you  first  meet  him  if  it's  in 
some  one's  parlour,  but  he  ain't  one  you'd  care  to  fol 
low  step  by  step  through  the  mazes  and  pitfalls  and 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          371 

palmrooms  of  a  great  city  if  you're  sensitive  to  public 
notice.  Still,  they  was  all  so  hearty  in  their  urging, 
Ben  saying  I  was  the  only  lady  in  the  world  he  could 
travel  that  far  with  and  not  want  to  strangle,  and  Lon 
says  he'd  rather  have  me  than  most  of  the  men  he 
knew,  and  Jeff  says  if  I'll  consent  to  go  he'll  take  his 
full-dress  suit  so  as  to  escort  me  to  operas  and  lectures 
in  a  classy  manner,  and  at  last  I  give  up.  I  said  I'd 
horn  in  on  their  party  since  none  of  'em  seemed 
hostile. 

I'd  meant  to  go  a  little  later  anyway,  for  some 
gowns  I  needed  and  some  shopping  I'd  promised  to 
do  for  Lizzie  Gunslaugh.  You  got  to  hand  it  to  New 
York  for  shopping.  Why,  I'd  as  soon  buy  an  evening 
gown  in  Los  Angeles  as  in  Portland  or  San  Francisco. 
Take  this  same  Lizzie  Gunslaugh.  She  used  to  make 
a  bare  living,  with  her  sign  reading  "Plain  and  Fash 
ionable  Dressmaking."  But  I  took  that  girl  down  to 
New  York  twice  with  me  and  showed  her  how  and 
what  to  buy  there,  instead  of  going  to  Spokane  for  her 
styles,  and  to-day  she's  got  a  thriving  little  business 
with  a  bully  sign  that  we  copied  from  them  in  the  East 
— "Madame  Elizabeth,  Robes  et  Manteaux."  Yes, 
sir;  New  York  has  at  least  one  real  reason  for  taking 
up  room.  That's  a  thing  I  always  try  to  get  into  Ben 
Sutton's  head,  that  he'd  ought  to  buy  his  clothes 
down  there  instead  of  getting  'em  from  a  reckless 
devil-dare  of  a  tailor  up  in  Seattle  that  will  do  any 
thing  in  the  world  Ben  tells  him  to — and  he  tells  him  a 
plenty,  believe  me.  He  won't  ever  wear  a  dress  suit, 


372          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

either,  because  he  says  that  costume  makes  all  men 
look  alike  and  he  ain't  going  to  stifle  his  individuality. 
If  you  seen  Ben's  figure  once  you'd  know  that  nothing 
could  make  him  look  like  any  one  else,  him  being 
built  on  the  lines  of  a  grain  elevator  and  having  in 
dividuality  no  clothes  on  earth  could  stifle.  He's  the 
very  last  man  on  earth  that  should  have  coloured 
braid  on  his  check  suits.  However ! 

My  trunk  is  packed  in  a  hurry  and  I'm  down  to  the 
6:10  on  time.  Lon  is  very  scared  and  jubilant  over 
deserting  Henrietta  in  this  furtive  way,  and  Ben  is  all 
ebullient  in  a  new  suit  that  looks  like  a  lodge  regalia 
and  Jeff  Tuttle  in  plain  clothes  is  as  happy  as  a  child. 
When  I  get  there  he's  already  begun  to  give  his  imita 
tion  of  a  Sioux  squaw  with  a  hare  lip  reciting  "Curfew 
Shall  Not  Ring  To-night"  in  her  native  language, 
which  he  pulls  on  all  occasions  when  he's  feeling  too 
good.  It's  some  imitation.  The  Sioux  language, 
even  when  spoken  by  a  trained  elocutionist,  can't  be 
anything  dulcet.  Jeff's  stunt  makes  it  sound  like 
grinding  coffee  and  shovelling  coal  into  a  cellar  at  the 
same  time.  Anyway,  our  journey  begun  happily  and 
proved  to  be  a  good  one,  the  days  passing  pleasantly 
while  we  talked  over  old  times  and  played  ten-cent 
limit  in  my  stateroom,  though  Jeff  Tuttle  is  so  un- 
travelled  that  he'll  actually  complain  about  the  food 
and  service  in  a  dining-car.  The  poor  puzzled  old 
cow-man  still  thinks  you  ought  to  get  a  good  meal  in 
one,  like  the  pretty  bill  of  fare  says  you  can. 

Then  one  morning  we  was  in  New  York  and  Ben 


SOMEWHERE  IN  BED  GAP  373 

Sutton  got  his  first  shock.  He  believed  he  was  still 
on  the  other  side  of  the  river  because  he  hadn't  rid  in  a 
ferryboat  yet.  He  had  to  be  told  sharply  by  parties 
in  uniform.  But  we  got  him  safe  to  a  nice  tall  hotel 
on  Broadway  at  last.  Talk  about  your  hicks  from 
the  brush — Ben  was  it,  coming  back  to  this  here 
birthplace  of  his.  He  fell  into  a  daze  on  the  short 
ride  to  the  hotel — after  insisting  hotly  that  we 
should  go  to  one  that  was  pulled  down  ten  years  ago — 
and  he  never  did  get  out  of  it  all  that  day. 

Lon  and  Jeff  was  dazed,  too.  The  city  filled  'em 
with  awe  and  they  made  no  pretense  to  the  contrary. 
About  all  they  did  that  day  was  to  buy  picture  cards 
and  a  few  drinks.  They  was  afraid  to  wander  very 
far  from  the  hotel  for  fear  they'd  get  run  over  or 
arrested  or  fall  into  the  new  subway  or  something 
calamitous  like  that.  Of  course  New  York  was  look 
ing  as  usual,  the  streets  being  full  of  tired  voters 
tearing  up  the  car-tracks  and  digging  first-line  trenches 
and  so  forth. 

It  was  a  quiet  day  for  all  of  us,  though  I  got  my 
shopping  started,  and  at  night  we  met  at  the  hotel 
and  had  a  lonesome  dinner.  We  was  all  too  dazed 
and  tired  to  feel  like  larking  about  any,  and  poor  Ben 
was  so  downright  depressed  it  was  pathetic.  Ever 
read  the  story  about  a  man  going  to  sleep  and  waking 
up  in  a  glass  case  in  a  museum  a  thousand  years  later? 
That  was  Ben  coming  back  to  his  old  town  after  only 
twenty-five  years.  He  hadn't  been  able  to  find  a 
single  old  friend  nor  any  familiar  faces.  He  ordered 


374  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

a  porterhouse  steak,  family  style,  for  himself,  but  he 
was  so  mournful  he  couldn't  eat  more  than  about  two 
dollars'  worth  of  it.  He  kept  forgetting  himself  in  dis 
mal  reminiscences.  The  onlysright  thing  he'd  found 
was  the  men  tearing  up  the  streets.  That  was  just 
like  they  used  to  be,  he  said.  He  maundered  on  to  us 
about  how  horse-cars  was  running  on  Broadway  when 
he  left  and  how  they  hardly  bothered  to  light  the 
lamps  north  of  Forty-second  Street,  and  he  wished  he 
could  have  some  fish  balls  like  the  old  Sinclair  House 
used  to  have  for  its  free  lunch,  and  how  in  them 
golden  days  people  that  had  been  born  right  here  in 
New  York  was  seen  so  frequently  that  they  created 
no  sensation. 

He  was  feeling  awful  desolate  about  this.  He 
pointed  out  different  parties  at  tables  around  us,  say 
ing  they  was  merchant  princes  from  Sandusky  or 
prominent  Elks  from  Omaha  or  roystering  blades  from 
Pittsburgh  or  boulevardeers  from  Bucyrus — not  a 
New  Yorker  in  sight.  He  said  he'd  been  reading 
where  a  wealthy  nut  had  sent  out  an  expedition  to  the 
North  Pole  to  capture  a  certain  kind  of  Arctic  flea  that 
haunts  only  a  certain  rare  fox — but  he'd  bet  a  born 
New  Yorker  was  harder  to  find.  He  said  what  this 
millionaire  defective  ought  to  of  done  with  his  in 
herited  wealth  was  to  find  a  male  and  female  born 
here  and  have  'em  stuffed  and  mounted  under  glass 
in  a  fire-proof  museum,  which  would  be  a  far  more 
exciting  spectacle  than  any  flea  on  earth,  however 
scarce  and  arctic.  He  said  he'd  asked  at  least  forty 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          375 

men  that  day  where  they  was  born — waiters,  taxi- 
drivers,  hotel  clerks,  bartenders,  and  just  anybody 
that  would  stop  and  take  one  with  him,  and  not  a 
soul  had  been  born  nearer  to  the  old  town  than 
Scranton,  Pennsylvania.  "It's  heart-rending,"  he 
says,  "to  reflect  that  I'm  alone  here  in  this  big  city  of 
outlanders.  I  haven't  even  had  the  nerve  to  go  down 
to  West  Ninth  Street  for  a  look  at  the  old  home  that 
shelters  my  boyhood  memories.  If  I  could  find  only 
one  born  New  Yorker  it  would  brace  me  up  a  whole 
lot." 

It  was  one  dull  evening,  under  this  cloud  that  en 
veloped  Ben.  We  didn't  even  go  to  a  show,  but 
turned  in  early.  Lon  Price  sent  a  picture  card  of  the 
Flatiron  Building  to  Henrietta  telling  her  he  was  hav 
ing  a  dreary  time  and  he  was  now  glad  he'd  been  dis 
appointed  about  her  not  coming,  so  love  and  kisses 
from  her  lonesome  boy.  It  was  what  he  would  of 
sent  her  anyway,  but  it  happened  to  be  the  truth  so 
far. 

Well,  I  got  the  long  night's  rest  that  was  coming  to 
me  and  started  out  early  in  the  A.  M.  to  pit  my  cun 
ning  against  the  wiles  of  the  New  York  department 
stores,  having  had  my  evil  desires  inflamed  the  day 
before  by  an  afternoon  gown  in  chiffon  velvet  and 
Georgette  crepe  with  silver  embroidery  and  fur  trim 
ming  that  I'd  seen  in  a  window  marked  down  to 
$198.98.  I  fell  for  that  all  right,  and  for  an  all-silk 
jersey  sport  suit  at  $29.98  and  a  demi-tailored  walk 
ing  suit  for  a  mere  bagatelle,  and  a  white  corduroy 


376          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

sport  blouse  and  a  couple  of  imported  evening  gowns 
they  robbed  me  on — but  I  didn't  mind.  You  expect 
to  be  robbed  for  anything  really  good  in  New  York, 
only  the  imitation  stuff  that's  worn  by  the  idle  poor 
being  cheaper  than  elsewhere.  And  I  was  so  busy  in 
this  whirl  of  extortion  that  I  forgot  all  about  the 
boys  and  their  troubles  till  I  got  back  to  the  hotel  at 
five  o'clock. 

I  find  'em  in  the  palm  grill,  or  whatever  it's  called, 
drinking  stingers.  But  now  they  was  not  only  more 
cheerful  than  they  had  been  the  night  before  but  they 
was  getting  a  little  bit  contemptuous  and  Western 
about  the  great  city.  Lon  had  met  a  brother  real 
estate  shark  from  Salt  Lake  and  Jeff  had  fell  in  with 
a  sheep  man  from  Laramie — and  treated  him  like  an 
equal  because  of  meeting  him  so  far  from  home  in  a 
strange  town  where  no  one  would  find  it  out  on  him — 
and  Ben  Sutton  had  met  up  with  his  old  friend  Jake 
Berger,  also  from  Nome.  That's  one  nice  thing 
about  New  York;  you  keep  meeting  people  from  out 
your  way  that  are  lonesome,  too.  Lon's  friend  and 
Jeff's  sheep  man  had  had  to  leave,  being  encumbered 
by  watchful-waiting  wives  that  were  having  'em 
paged  every  three  minutes  and  wouldn't  believe  the 
boy  when  he  said  they  was  out.  But  Ben's  friend, 
Jake  Berger,  was  still  at  the  table.  Jake  is  a  good 
soul,  kind  of  a  short,  round,  silent  man,  never  opening 
his  head  for  any  length  of  time.  He  seems  to  bring 
the  silence  of  the  frozen  North  down  with  him  except 
for  brief  words  to  the  waiter  ever  and  anon. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  377 

As  I  say,  the  boys  was  all  more  cheerful  and  con 
temptuous  about  New  York  by  this  time.  Ben  had 
spent  another  day  asking  casual  parties  if  they  was 
born  in  New  York  and  having  no  more  luck  than  a 
rabbit,  but  it  seemed  like  he'd  got  hardened  to  these 
disappointments.  He  said  he  might  leave  his  own 
self  to  a  museum  in  due  time,  so  future  generations 
would  know  at  least  what  the  male  New  Yorker 
looked  like.  As  for  the  female,  he  said  any  of  these 
blondes  along  Broadway  could  be  made  to  look  near 
enough  like  his  mate  by  a  skilled  taxidermist.  Jeff 
Tuttle  here  says  that  they  wasn't  all  blondes  because 
he'd  seen  a  certain  brunette  that  afternoon  right  in 
this  palm  grill  that  was  certainly  worth  preserving  for 
all  eternity  in  the  grandest  museum  on  earth — which 
showed  that  Jeff  had  chirked  up  a  lot  since  landing  in 
town.  Ben  said  he  had  used  the  term  "blonde" 
merely  to  designate  a  species  and  they  let  it  go  at 
that. 

Lon  Price  then  said  he'd  been  talking  a  little  him 
self  to  people  he  met  in  different  places  and  they 
might  not  be  born  New  Yorkers  but  they  certainly 
didn't  know  anything  beyond  the  city  limits.  At 
this  he  looks  around  at  the  crowded  tables  in  this 
palm  grill  and  says  very  bitterly  that  he'll  give  any  of 
us  fifty  to  one  they  ain't  a  person  in  the  place  that  ever 
so  much  as  even  heard  of  Price's  Addition  to  Red 
Gap.  And  so  the  talk  went  for  a  little,  with  Jake 
Berger  ever  and  again  crooning  to  the  waiter  for  an 
other  round  of  stingers.  I'd  had  two,  so  I  stayed  out 


378  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

on  the  last  round.  I  told  Jake  I  enjoyed  his  hospi 
tality  but  two  would  be  all  I  could  think  under  till 
they  learned  to  leave  the  dash  of  chloroform  out  of 
mine.  Jake  just  looked  kindly  at  me.  He's  as 
chatty  as  Mount  McKinley. 

But  I  was  glad  to  see  the  boys  more  cheerful,  so  I 
said  I'd  get  my  lumpiest  jewels  out  of  the  safe  and  put 
a  maid  and  hairdresser  to  work  on  me  so  I'd  be  a 
credit  to  'em  at  dinner  and  then  we'd  spend  a  jolly 
evening  at  some  show.  Jeff  said  he'd  also  doll  up  in 
his  :  dress  suit  and  get  shaved  and  manicured  and 
everything,  so  he'd  look  like  one  in  my  own  walk  of 
life.  Ben  was  already  dressed  for  evening.  He  had 
on  a  totally  new  suit  of  large  black  and  white  checks 
looking  like  a  hotel  floor  from  a  little  distance,  bound 
with  braid  of  a  quiet  brown,  and  with  a  vest  of  wide 
stripes  in  green  and  mustard  colour.  It  was  a  suit 
that  the  automobile  law  in  some  states  would  have 
compelled  him  to  put  dimmers  on;  it  made  him  look 
egregious,  if  that's  the  word;  but  I  knew  it  was  no 
good  appealing  to  his  better  nature.  He  said  he'd 
have  dinner  ordered  for  us  in  another  palm  grill  that 
had  more  palms  in  it. 

Jake  Berger  spoke  up  for  the  first  time  to  any  one 
but  a  waiter.  He  asked  why  a  palm  room  neces 
sarily?  He  said  the  tropic  influence  of  these  palms 
must  affect  the  waiters  that  had  to  stand  under  'em 
all  day,  because  they  wouldn't  take  his  orders  fast 
enough.  He  said  the  languorous  Southern  atmos 
phere  give  'em  pellagra  or  something.  Jeff  Tuttle 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          379 

says  Jake  must  be  mistaken  because  the  pellagra  is  a 
kind  of  a  Spanish  dance,  he  believes.  Jake  said 
maybe  so;  maybe  it  was  tropic  neurasthenia  the 
waiters  got.  Ben  said  he'd  sure  look  out  for  a  fresh 
waiter  that  hadn't  been  infected  yet.  When  I  left 
'em  Jake  was  holding  a  split-second  watch  on  the 
waiter  he'd  just  given  an  order  to. 

By  seven  P.  M.  I'd  been  made  into  a  work  of 
art  by  the  hotel  help  and  might  of  been  ob 
served  progressing  through  the  palatial  lobby  with 
my  purple  and  gold  opera  cloak  sort  of  falling  awtay 
from  the  shoulders.  Jeff  Tuttle  observed  me  for  one. 
He  was  in  his  dress  suit  all  right,  standing  over  in  a 
corner  having  a  bell-hop  tie  his  tie  for  him  that  he 
never  can  learn  to  do  himself.  That's  the  way  with 
Jeff;  he  simply  wasn't  born  for  the  higher  hotel  life. 
In  his  dress  suit  he  looks  exactly  like  this  here  society 
burglar  you're  always  seeing  a  picture  of  in  the  pa 
pers.  However,  I  let  him  trail  me  along  into  this 
jewelled  palm  room  with  tapestries  and  onyx  pillars 
and  prices  for  food  like  the  town  had  been  three  years 
beleagured  by  an  invading  army.  Jake  Berger  is 
alone  at  our  table  sipping  a  stinger  and  looking  em 
barrassed  because  he'll  have  to  say  something.  He 
gets  it  over  as  soon  as  he  can.  He  says  Ben  has  or 
dered  dinner  and  stepped  out  and  that  Lon  has 
stepped  out  to  look  for  him  but  they'll  both  be  back 
in  a  minute,  so  set  down  and  order  one  before  this  new 
waiter  is  overcome  by  the  tropic  miasma.  We  do 
the  same,  and  in  comes  Lon  looking  very  excited 


380          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED^  GAP 

in  the]  dress  suit  he  was  married  in  back  about 
1884. 

"Ben's  found  one,"  he  squeals  excitedly — "a  real 
genuine  one  that  was  born  right  here  in  New  York 
and  is  still  living  in  the  same  house  he  was  born  in. 
What  do  you  know  about  that?  Ben  is  frantic  with 
delight  and  is  going  to  bring  him  to  dine  with  us  as 
soon  as  he  gets  him  brushed  off  down  in  the  wash  room 
and  maybe  a  drink  or  two  thrown  into  him  to  revive 
him  from  the  shock  of  Ben  running  across  him. 
Ain't  it  good,  though!  Poor  old  Ben,  looking  for  a 
born  one  and  thinking  he'd  never  find  him  and  now  he 
has!" 

We  all  said  how  glad  we  was  for  Ben's  sake  and 
Lon  called  over  a  titled  aristocrat  of  foreign  birth 
and  ordered  him  to  lay  another  place  at  the  table. 
Then  he  tells  us  how  the  encounter  happened.  Ben 
had  stepped  out  on  Broadway  to  buy  an  evening 
paper  and  coming  back  he  was  sneaking  a  look  at  his 
new  suit  in  a  plate-glass  window,  walking  blindly 
ahead  at  the  same  time.  That's  the  difference  be 
tween  the  sexes  in  front  of  a  plate-glass  window.  A 
woman  is  entirely  honest  and  shameless;  she'll  stop 
dead  and  look  herself  over  and  touch  up  anything 
that  needs  it  as  cool  as  if  she  was  the  last  human 
on  earth;  while  man,  the  coward,  walks  by  slow  and 
takes  a  long  sly  look  at  himself,  turning  his  head 
more  and  more  till  he  gets  swore  at  by  some  one  he's 
tramped  on.  This  is  how  Ben  had  run  across  the 
only  genuine  New  Yorker  that  seemed  to  be  left. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  381 

He'd  run  across  his  left  instep  and  then  bore  him  to 
the  ground  like  one  of  these  juggernuts  or  whatever 
they  are.  Still,  at  that,  it  seemed  kind  of  a  romantic 
meeting,  like  mebbe  the  hand  of  fate  was  in  it.  We 
chatted  along,  waiting  for  the  happy  pair,  and  Jake 
ordered  again  to  be  on  the  safe  side  because  the 
waiter  would  be  sure  to  contract  hookworm  or  sleep 
ing  sickness  in  this  tropic  jungle  before  the  evening 
was  over.  Jeff  Tuttle  said  this  was  called  the  Louis 
Chateau  room  and  he  liked  it.  He  also  said,  looking 
over  the  people  that  come  in,  that  he  bet  every  dress 
suit  in  town  was  hired  to-night.  Then  in  a  minute 
or  two  more,  after  Jake  Berger  sent  a  bill  over  to  the 
orchestra  leader  with  a  card  asking  him  to  play  all 
quick  tunes  so  the  waiters  could  fight  better  against 
jungle  fever,  in  comes  Ben  Sutton  driving  his  captive 
New  Yorker  before  him  and  looking  as  flushed  and 
proud  as  if  he'd  discovered  a  strange  new  vest  pat 
tern. 

The  captive  wasn't  so  much  to  look  at.  He  was 
kind  of  neat,  dressed  in  one  of  the  nobby  suits  that 
look  like  ninety  dollars  in  the  picture  and  cost 
eighteen;  he  had  one  of  these  smooth  ironed  faces 
that  made  him  look  thirty  or  forty  years  old,  like 
all  New  York  men,  and  he  had  the  conventional 
glue  on  his  hair.  He  was  limping  noticeably  where 
Ben  had  run  across  him,  and  I  could  see  he  was  highly 
suspicious  of  the  whole  gang  of  us,  including  the  man 
who  had  treated  him  like  he  was  a  cockroach.  But 
Ben  had  been  persuasive  and  imperious — took  him 


382          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

off  his  feet,  like  you  might  say — so  he  shook  hands 
all  around  and  ventured  to  set  down  with  us.  He 
had  the  same  cold,  slippery  cautious  hand  that 
every  New  York  man  gives  you  the  first  time  so  I 
says  to  myself  he's  a  real  one  all  right  and  we  fell  to 
the  new  round  of  stingers  Jake  had  motioned  for,  and 
to  the  nouveaux  art- work  food  that  now  came  along. 

Naturally  Ben  and  the  New  Yorker  done  most  of 
the  talking  at  first;  about  how  the  good  old  town  had 
changed;  how  they  was  just  putting  up  the  Cable 
Building  at  Houston  Street  when  Ben  left  in  '92,  and 
wasn't  the  old  Everett  House  a  good  place  for  lunch, 
and  did  the  other  one  remember  Barnum's  Museum 
at  Broadway  and  Ann,  and  Niblo's  Garden  was  still 
there  when  Ben  was,  and  a  lot  of  fascinating  memories 
like  that.  The  New  Yorker  didn't  relax  much  at 
first  and  got  distinctly  nervous  when  he  saw  the 
costly  food  and  heard  Ben  order  vintage  champagne 
which  he  always  picks  out  by  the  price  on  the  wine 
list.  I  could  see  him  plain  as  day  wondering  just 
what  kind  of  crooks  we  could  be,  what  our  game  was 
and  how  soon  we'd  spring  it  on  him — or  would  we 
mebbe  stick  him  for  the  dinner  check?  He  didn't 
have  a  bit  good  time  at  first,  so  us  four  others  kind  of 
left  Ben  to  fawn  upon  him  and  enjoyed  ourselves  in 
our  own  way. 

It  was  all  quite  elevating  or  vicious,  what  with  the 
orchestra  and  the  singers  and  the  dancing  and  the 
waiters  with  vitality  still  unimpaired.  And  New 
York  has  improved  a  lot,  I'll  say  that.  The  time  I 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  383 

was  there  before  they  wouldn't  let  a  lady  smoke  ex 
cept  in  the  very  lowest  table  d'hotes  of  the  under 
world  at  sixty  cents  with  wine.  And  now  the  only 
one  in  the  whole  room  that  didn't  light  a  cigarette 
from  time  to  time  was  a  nervous  dame  in  a  high- 
necked  black  silk  and  a  hat  that  was  never  made 
farther  east  than  Altoona,  that  looked  like  she  might 
be  taking  notes  for  a  club  paper  on  the  attractions  or 
iniquities  of  a  great  metropolis.  Jeff  Tuttle  was 
fascinated  by  the  dancing;  he  called  it  the  "tangle" 
and  some  of  it  did  look  like  that.  And  he  claimed 
to  be  shocked  by  the  flagrant  way  women  opened  up 
little  silver  boxes  and  applied  the  paints,  oils,  and 
putty  in  full  view  of  the  audience.  He  said  he'd 
just  as  lief  see  a  woman  take  out  a  manicure  set  and 
do  her  nails  in  public,  and  I  assured  him  he  probably 
would  see  it  if  he  come  down  again  next  year,  the  way 
things  was  going — him  talking  that  way  that  had  had 
his  white  tie  done  in  the  open  lobby ;  but  men  are  such. 
Jake  Berger  just  looked  around  kindly  and  didn't 
open  his  head  till  near  the  end  of  the  meal.  I 
thought  he  wasn't  noticing  anything  at  all  till  the 
orchestra  put  on  a  shadow  number  with  dim  purple 
lights. 

"You'll  notice  they  do  that,"  says  Jake,  "whenever 
a  lot  of  these  people  are  ready  to  pay  their  checks. 
It  saves  fights,  because  no  one  can  see  if  they're 
added  right  or  not."  That  was  pretty  gabby  for 
Jake.  Then  I  listened  again  to  Ben  and  his  little 
pet.  They  was  talking  their  way  up  the  Bowery  from 


384          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Atlantic  Garden  and  over  to  Harry  Hill's  Place  which 
it  seemed  the  New  Yorker  didn't  remember,  and  Ben 
then  recalled  an  old  leper  with  gray  whiskers  and  a 
skull  cap  that  kept  a  drug  store  in  Bleecker  Street 
when  Ben  was  a  kid  and  spent  most  of  his  time  water 
ing  down  the  sidewalk  in  front  of  his  place  with  a 
hose  so  that  ladies  going  by  would  have  to  raise  their 
skirts  out  of  the  wet.  His  eyes  was  quite  dim  as  he 
recalled  these  sacred  boyhood  memories. 

The  New  Yorker  had  unbent  a  mite  like  he  was 
going  to  see  the  mad  adventure  through  at  all  costs, 
though  still  plainly  worried  about  the  dinner  check. 
Ben  now  said  that  they  two  ought  to  found  a  New 
York  club.  He  said  there  was  all  other  kinds  of 
clubs  here — Ohio  clubs  and  Southern  clubs  and 
Nebraska  societies  and  Michigan  circles  and  so  on, 
that  give  large  dinners  every  year,  so  why  shouldn't 
there  be  a  New  York  club;  maybe  they  could  scare 
up  three  or  four  others  that  was  born  here  if  they 
advertised.  It  would  of  course  be  the  smallest  club 
in  the  city  or  in  the  whole  world  for  that  matter. 
The  New  Yorker  was  kind  of  cold  toward  this. 
It  must  of  sounded  like  the  scheme  to  get  money  out 
of  him  that  he'd  been  expecting  all  along.  Then  the 
waiter  brought  the  check,  during  another  shadow 
number  with  red  and  purple  lights,  and  this  lad 
pulled  out  a  change  purse  and  said  in  a  feeble  voice 
that  he  supposed  we  was  all  paying  share  and  share 
alike  and  would  the  waiter  kindly  figure  out  what 
his  share  was.  Ben  didn't  even  hear  him.  He  peeled 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  385 

a  large  bill  off  a  roll  that  made  his  new  suit  a  bad 
fit  in  one  place  and  he  left  a  five  on  the  plate  when 
the  change  come.  The  watchful  New  Yorker  now 
made  his  first  full-hearted  speech  of  the  evening.  He 
said  that  Ben  was  foolish  not  to  of  added  up  the 
check  to  see  if  it  was  right,  and  that  half  a  dollar  tip 
would  of  been  ample  for  the  waiter.  Ben  pretended 
not  to  hear  this  either,  and  started  again  on  the  dear 
old  times.  I  says  to  myself  I  guess  this  one  is  a  real 
New  Yorker  all  right. 

Lon  Prince  now  says  what's  the  matter  with  going 
to  some  corking  good  show  because  nothing  good  has 
come  to  Red  Gap  since  the  Parisian  Blond  Widows 
over  a  year  ago  and  he's  eager  for  entertainment. 
Ben  says  "Fine!  And  here's  the  wise  boy  that  will 
steer  us  right.  I  bet  he  knows  every  show  in  town." 
The  New  Yorker  says  he  does  and  has  just  the 
play  in  mind  for  us,  one  that  he  had  meant  to  see 
himself  this  very  night  because  it  has  been  endorsed 
by  the  drama  league  of  which  he  is  a  regular  member. 
Well,  that  sounded  important,  so  Ben  says  "What  did 
I  tell  you?  Ain't  we  lucky  to  have  a  good  old  New 
Yorker  to  put  us  right  on  shows  our  first  night  out. 
We  might  have  wasted  our  evening  on  a  dead  one." 

So  we're  all  delighted  and  go  out  and  get  in  a 
couple  of  taxicabs,  Ben  and  this  city  man  going  in  the 
first  one.  When  ours  gets  to  the  theatre  Ben  is 
paying  the  driver  while  the  New  Yorker  feebly  pro 
tests  that  he  ought  to  pay  his  half  of  the  bill,  but 
Ben  don't  hear  him  and  don't  hear  him  again  when 


386  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

he  wants  to  pay  for  his  own  seat  in  the  theatre.  I 
got  my  first  suspicion  of  this  guy  right  there;  for  a 
genuine  New  Yorker  he  was  too  darned  conscientious 
about  paying  his  mere  share  of  everything.  You 
can  say  lots  of  things  about  New  Yorkers,  but  all 
that  I've  ever  met  have  been  keenly  and  instantly 
sensitive  to  the  presence  of  a  determined  buyer. 
Still  I  didn't  think  so  much  about  it  at  that  moment. 
This  one  looked  the  part  all  right,  with  his  slim  clothes 
and  his  natty  cloth  hat  and  the  thin  gold  cigarette 
case  held  gracefully  open.  Then  we  get  into  the 
theatre.  Of  course  Ben  had  bought  a  box,  that 
being  the  only  place,  he  says,  that  a  gentleman  can 
set,  owing  to  the  skimpy  notions  of  theatre-seat 
builders.  And  we  was  all  prepared  for  a  merry 
evening  at  this  entertainment  which  the  wise  New 
Yorker  would  be  sure  to  know  was  a  good  one. 

But  that  curtain  hadn't  been  up  three  minutes 
before  I  get  my  next  shock  of  disbelief  about  this 
well-known  club  man.  You  know  what  a  good  play 
means  in  New  York:  a  rattling  musical  comedy 
with  lively  songs,  a  tenor  naval  lieutenant  in  a  white 
uniform,  some  real  funny  comedians,  and  a  lot  of 
girls  without  their  stockings  on,  and  so  forth.  Any 
one  that  thinks  of  a  play  in  New  York  thinks  of 
that,  don't  he?  And  what  do  we  get  here  and  now? 
Why,  we  get  a  gruesome  thing  about  a  ruined  home 
with  the  owner  going  bankrupt  over  the  telephone 
that's  connected  with  Wall  Street,  and  a  fluffy  wife 
that  has  a  magnetic  gentleman  friend  in  a  sport  suit, 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  387 

and  a  lady  crook  that  has  had  husband  in  her  toils, 
only  he  sees  it  all  now,  and  tears  and  strangulations 
and  divorce,  and  a  faithful  old  butler  that  suffers 
keenly  and  would  go  on  doing  it  without  a  cent  of 
wages  if  he  could  only  bring  every  one  together  again, 
and  a  shot  up  in  the  bathroom  or  somewhere  and 
gripping  moments  and  so  forth — I  want  to  tell  you 
we  was  all  painfully  shocked  by  this  break  of  the 
knowing  New  Yorker.  We  could  hardly  believe 
it  was  true  during  the  first  act.  Jeff  Tuttle  kept 
wanting  to  know  when  the  girls  was  coming  on,  and 
didn't  they  have  a  muscle  dancer  in  the  piece.  Ben 
himself  was  highly  embarrassed  and  even  suspicious 
for  a  minute.  He  looks  at  the  New  Yorker  sharply 
and  says  ain't  that  a  crocheted  necktie  he's  wearing, 
and  the  New  Yorker  says  it  is  and  was  made  for  him 
by  his  aunt.  But  Ben  ain't  got  the  heart  to  question 
him  any  further.  He  puts  away  his  base  suspicions 
and  tries  to  get  the  New  Yorker  to  tell  us  all  about 
what  a  good  play  this  is  so  we'll  feel  more  enter 
tained.  So  the  lad  tells  us  the  leading  woman  is  a 
sterling  actress  of  legitimate  methods — all  too  hard 
to  find  in  this  day  of  sensationalism,  and  the  play  is  a 
triumph  of  advanced  realism  written  by  a  serious 
student  of  the  drama  that  is  trying  to  save  our  stage 
from  commercial  degradation.  He  explained  a  lot 
about  the  lesson  of  the  play.  Near  as  I  could  make 
out  the  lesson  was  that  divorce,  nowadays,  is  darned 
near  as  uncertain  as  marriage  itself. 

"The  husband,"  explains  the  lad  kindly,  "is  sus- 


388  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

pected  by  his  wife  to  have  been  leading  a  double  life, 
though  of  course  he  was  never  guilty  of  more  than 
an  indiscretion " 

Jake  Berger  here  exploded  rudely  into  speech 
again.  "That  wife  is  leading  a  double  chin,"  says 
Jake. 

"  Say,  ^people,"  says  Lon  Price,  "mebbe  it  ain't 
too  late  to  go  to  a  show  this  evening." 

But  the  curtain  went  up  for  the  second  act  and 
nobody  had  the  nerve  to  escape.  There  continued 
to  be  low  murmurs  of  rebellion,  just  the  same,  and 
we  all  lost  track  of  this  here  infamy  that  was  occur 
ring  on  the  stage. 

"I'm  sure  going  to  beat  it  in  one  minute,"  says 
Jeff  Tuttle,  "if  one  of  'em  don't  exclaim:  'Oh,  girls, 
here  comes  the  little  dancer!"3 

"I  know  a  black-face  turn  that  could  put  this 
show  on  its  feet,"  says  Lon  Price,  "and  that  Waldo 
in  the  sport  suit  ain't  any  real  reason  why  wives 
leave  home — you  can't  tell  me!" 

"I  dare  say  this  leading  woman  needs  a  better 
vehicle,"  says  the  New  Yorker  in  a  hoarse  whisper. 

"I  dare  say  it,  too,"  says  Jeff  Tuttle  in  a  still 
hoarser  whisper.  "A  better  vehicle!  She  needs  a 
motor  truck,and  I'd  order  one  quick  if  I  thought  she'd 
take  it." 

Of  course  this  was  not  refined  of  Jeff.  The  New 
Yorker  winced  and  loyal  Ben  glares  at  all  of  us  that 
has  been  muttering,  so  we  had  to  set  there  till  the 
curtain  went  down  on  the  ruined  home  where  all 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          389 

was  lost  save  honour — and  looking  like  that  would 
have  to  go,  too,  in  the  next  act.  But  Ben  saw  it 
wasn't  safe  to  push  us  any  further  so  he  now  said  this 
powerful  play  was  too  powerful  for  a  bunch  of  low 
brows  like  us  and  we  all  rushed  out  into  the  open 
air.  Everybody  cheered  up  a  lot  when  we  got  there 
— seeing  the  nice  orderly  street  traffic  without  a  grip 
ping  moment  in  it.  Lon  Price  said  it  was  too  late  to 
go  to  a  theatre,  so  what  could  we  do  to  pass  the  time 
till  morning?  Ben  says  he  has  a  grand  idea  and  we 
can  carry  it  out  fine  with  this  New  York  man  to  guide 
us.  His  grand  idea  is  that  we  all  go  down  on  the 
Bowery  and  visit  tough  dives  where  the  foul  crea 
tures  of  the  underworld  consort  and  crime  happens 
every  minute  or  two.  We  was  still  mad  enough 
about  that  play  to  like  the  idea.  A  good  legitimate 
murder  would  of  done  wonders  for  our  drooping 
spirits.  So  Ben  puts  it  up  to  the  New  Yorker  and 
he  says  yes,  he  knows  a  vicious  resort  on  the  Bowery, 
but  we'd  ought  to  have  a  detective  from  central  office 
along  to  protect  us  from  assault.  Ben  says  not  at 
all — no  detective — unless  the  joints  has  toughened 
up  a  lot  since  he  used  to  infest  'em,  and  we  all  said 
we'd  take  a  chance,  so  again  we  was  in  taxicabs. 
Us  four  in  the  second  cab  was  now  highly  cynical 
about  Ben's  New  Yorker.  The  general  feeling  was 
that  sooner  or  later  he  would  sink  the  ship. 

Then  we  reach  the  dive  he  has  picked  out;  a  very 
dismal  dive  with  a  room  back  of  the  bar  that  had  a 
few  tables  and  a  piano  in  it  and  a  sweet-singing 


390          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

waiter.  He  was  singing  a  song  about  home  and 
mother,  that  in  mem-o-ree  he  seemed  to  see,  when 
we  got  to  our  table.  A  very  gloomy  and  respectable 
haunt  of  vice  it  was,  indeed.  There  was  about  a 
dozen  male  and  female  creatures  of  the  underworld 
present  sadly  enjoying  this  here  ballad  and  scowling 
at  us  for  talking  when  we  come  in. 

Jake  Berger  ordered,  though  finding  you  couldn't 
get  stingers  here  and  having  to  take  two  miner's 
inches  of  red  whiskey,  and  the  New  Yorker  begun  to 
warn  us  in  low  tones  that  we  was  surrounded  by 
danger  on  every  hand — that  we'd  better  pour  our 
drink  on  the  floor  because  it  would  be  drugged,  after 
which  we  would  be  robbed  if  not  murdered  and  thrown 
out  into  the  alley  where  we  would  then  be  arrested 
by  grafting  policemen.  Even  Ben  was  shocked  by 
this  warning.  He  asks  the  New  Yorker  again  if  he  is 
sure  he  was  born  in  the  old  town,  and  the  lad  says 
honest  he  was  and  has  been  living  right  here  all  these 
years  in  the  same  house  he  was  born  in.  Ben  is 
persuaded  by  these  words  and  gives  the  singing  waiter 
a  five  and  tells  him  to  try  and  lighten  the  gloom  with 
a  few  crimes  of  violence  or  something.  The  New 
Yorker  continued  to  set  stiff  in  his  chair,  one  hand 
on  his  watch  and  one  on  the  pocket  where  his  change 
purse  was  that  he'd  tried  to  pay  his  share  of  the 
taxicabs  out  of. 

The  gloom-stricken  piano  player  now  rattled  off 
some  ragtime  and  the  depraved  denizens  about  us 
got  sadly  up  and  danced  to  it.  Say,  it  was  the  most 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          391 

formal  and  sedate  dancing  you  ever  see,  with  these 
gun  men  holding  their  guilty  partners  off  at  arm's 
length  and  their  faces  all  drawn  down  in  lines  of 
misery.  They  looked  like  they  might  be  a  bunch  of 
strict  Presbyterians  that  had  resolved  to  throw  all 
moral  teaching  to  the  winds  for  one  purple  moment 
let  come  what  might.  I  want  to  tell  you  these  de 
praved  creatures  of  the  underworld  was  darned  near 
as  depressing  as  that  play  had  been.  Even  the  sec 
ond  round  of  drinks  didn't  liven  us  up  none  because 
the  waiter  threw  down  his  cigarette  and  sung  another 
tearful  song.  This  one  was  about  a  travelling  man 
going  into  a  gilded  cabaret  and  ordering  a  port  wine 
and  a  fair  young  girl  come  out  to  sing  in  short  skirts 
that  he  recognized  to  be  his  boyhood's  sweetheart 
Nell;  so  he  sent  a  waiter  to  ask  her  if  she  had  forgot 
the  song  she  once  did  sing  at  her  dear  old  mother's 
knee,  or  knees,  and  she  hadn't  forgot  it  and  proved 
she  hadn't,  because  the  chorus  was  "Nearer  My  God 
to  Thee"  sung  to  ragtime;  then  the  travelling  man 
said  she  must  be  good  and  pure,  so  come  on  let's 
leave  this  place  and  they'd  be  wed. 

Yes,  sir;  that's  what  Ben  had  got  for  his  five,  so 
this  time  he  give  the  waiter  a  twenty  not  to  sing  any 
more  at  all.  The  New  Yorker  was  horrified  at  the 
sight  of  a  man  giving  away  money,  but  it  was  well 
spent  and  we  begun  to  cheer  up  a  little.  Ben  told 
the  New  Yorker  about  the  time  his  dog  team  won  the 
All  Alaska  Sweepstake  Race,  two  hundred  and  six 
miles  from  Nome  to  Candle  and  back,  the  time  being 


392          SOMEWHERE  INURED  GAP 

76  hours,  16  minutes,  and  28  seconds,  and  showed  him 
the  picture  of  his  lead  dog  pasted  in  the  back  of  his 
watch.  And  Jake  Berger  got  real  gabby  at  last  and 
told  the  story  about  the  old  musher  going  up  the 
White  Horse  Trail  in  a  blizzard  and  meeting  the 
Bishop,  only  he  didn't  know  it  was  the  Bishop.  And 
the  Bishop  says,  "How's  the  trail  back  of  you,  my 
friend?"  and  the  old  musher  just  swore  with  the  ut 
most  profanity  for  three  straight  minutes.  Then  he 
says  to  the  Bishop,  "And  what's  it  like  back  of  you?  " 
and  the  Bishop  says,  "Just  like  that!"  Jake  here 
got  embarrassed  from  talking  so  much  and  ordered 
another  round  of  this  squirrel  poison  we  was  getting, 
and  Jeff  Tuttle  begun  his  imitation  of  the  Sioux  squaw 
with  a  hare  lip  reciting  "Curfew  Shall  Not  Ring  To 
night."  It  was  a  pretty  severe  ordeal  for  the  rest  of 
us,  but  we  was  ready  to  endure  much  if  it  would  make 
this  low  den  seem  more  homelike.  Only  when  Jeff 
got  about  halfway  through  the  singing  waiter  comes 
up,  greatly  shocked,  and  says  none  of  that  in  here 
because  they  run  an  orderly  place,  and  we  been  talk 
ing  too  loud  anyway.  This  waiter  had  a  skull  ex 
actly  like  a  picture  of  one  in  a  book  I  got  that  was 
dug  up  after  three  hundred  thousand  years  and  the 
scientific  world  couldn't  ever  agree  whether  it  was 
an  early  man  or  a  late  ape.  I  decided  I  didn't  care 
to  linger  in  a  place  where  a  being  with  a  head  like 
this  could  pass  on  my  diversions  and  offenses  so  I 
made  a  move  to  go.  Jeff  Tuttle  says  to  this  waiter, 
"Fie,  fie  upon  you,  Roscoe!  We  shall  go  to  some  re- 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          393 

spectable  place  where  we  can  loosen  up  without  be 
ing  called  for  it."  The  waiter  said  he  was  sorry, 
but  the  Bowery  wasn't  Broadway.  And  the  New 
Yorker  whispered  that  it  was  just  as  well  because  we 
was  lucky  to  get  out  of  this  dive  with  our  lives  and 
property — and  even  after  that  this  anthropoid 
waiter  come  hurrying  out  to  the  taxis  after  us  with 
my  fur  piece  and  my  solid  gold  vanity-box  that  I'd 
left  behind  on  a  chair.  This  was  a  bitter  blow  to 
all  of  us  after  we'd  been  led  to  hope  for  outrages  of  an 
illegal  character.  The  New  Yorker  was  certainly 
making  a  misdeal  every  time  he  got  the  cards.  None 
of  us  trusted  him  any  more,  though  Ben  was  still 
loyal  and  sensitive  about  him,  like  he  was  an  only 
child  and  from  birth  had  not  been  like  other  children. 

The  lad  now  wanted  to  steer  us  into  an  Allied 
Bazaar  that  would  still  be  open,  because  he'd  prom 
ised  to  sell  twenty  tickets  to  it  and  had  'em  on 
him  untouched.  But  we  shut  down  firmly  on  this. 
Even  Ben  was  firm.  He  said  the  last  bazaar  he'd 
survived  was  their  big  church  fair  in  Nome  that 
lasted  two  nights  and  one  day  and  the  champagne 
booth  alone  took  in  six  thousand  dollars,  and  even 
the  beer  booth  took  in  something  like  twelve  hundred, 
and  he  didn't  feel  equal  to  another  affair  like  that 
just  yet. 

So  we  landed  uptown  at  a  very  swell  joint  full  of 
tables  and  orchestras  around  a  dancing  floor  and  more 
palms — which  is  the  national  flower  of  New  York — 
and  about  eighty  or  a  hundred  slightly  inebriated 


394          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

debutantes  and  well-known  Broadway  social  favour 
ites  and  their  gentlemen  friends.  And  here  every 
thing  seemed  satisfactory  at  last,  except  to  the  New 
Yorker  who  said  that  the  prices  would  be  something 
shameful.  However,  no  one  was  paying  any  atten 
tion  to  him  by  now.  None  of  us  but  Ben  cared  a 
hoot  where  he  had  been  born  and  most  of  us  was  sorry 
he  had  been  at  all. 

Jake  Berger  bought  a  table  for  ten  dollars,  which 
was  seven  more  than  it  had  ever  cost  the  owner,  and 
Ben  ordered  stuff  for  us,  including  a  vintage  cham 
pagne  that  the  price  of  stuck  out  far  enough  beyond 
other  prices  on  the  wine  list,  and  a  porterhouse  steak, 
family  style,  for  himself,  and  everything  seemed  on  a 
sane  and  rational  basis  again.  It  looked  as  if  we 
might  have  a  little  enjoyment  during  the  evening 
after  all.  It  was  a  good  lively  place,  with  all  these 
brilliant  society  people  mingling  up  in  the  dance  in 
a  way  that  would  of  got  'em  thrown  out  of  that  gang 
sters'  haunt  on  the  Bowery.  Lon  Price  said  he'd 
never  witnessed  so  many  human  shoulder  blades  in 
his  whole  history  and  Jeff  Tuttle  sent  off  a  lot  of 
picture  cards  of  this  here  ballroom  or  saloon  that 
a  waiter  give  him.  The  one  he  sent  Egbert  Floud 
showed  the  floor  full  of  beautiful  reckless  women  in 
the  dance  and  prominent  society  matrons  drinking 
highballs,  and  Jeff  wrote  on  it,  "This  is  my  room; 
wish  you  was  here."  Jeff  was  getting  right  into  the 
spirit  of  this  bohemian  night  life;  you  could  tell  that. 
Lon  Price  also.  In  ten  minutes  Lon  had  made  the 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  395 

acquaintance  of  a  New  York  social  leader  at  the  next 
table  and  was  dancing  with  her  in  an  ardent  or  ribald 
manner  before  Ben  had  finished  his  steak. 

I  now  noticed  that  the  New  Yorker  was  looking 
at  his  gun-metal  watch  about  every  two  minutes 
with  an  expression  of  alarm.  Jake  Berger  noticed 
it,  too,  and  again  leaned  heavily  on  the  conversation. 
"Not  keeping  you  up,  are  we?"  says  Jake.  And  this 
continual  watch  business  must  of  been  getting  on 
Ben's  nerves,  too,  for  now,  having  fought  his  steak 
to  a  finish,  he  says  to  his  little  guest  that  they  two 
should  put  up  their  watches  and  match  coins  for  'em. 
The  New  Yorker  was  suspicious  right  off  and  looked 
Ben's  watch  over  very  carefully  when  Ben  handed 
it  to  him.  It  was  one  of  these  thin  gold  ones  that  can 
be  had  any  place  for  a  hundred  dollars  and  up.  You 
could  just  see  that  New  Yorker  saying  to  himself, 
"So  this  is  their  game,  is  it?"  But  he  works  his, 
nerve  up  to  take  a  chance  and  gets  a  two-bit  piece 
out  of  his  change  purse  and  they  match.  Ben  wins 
the  first  time,  which  was  to  of  settled  it,  but  Ben 
says  right  quick  that  of  course  he  had  meant  the 
best  two  out  of  three,  which  the  New  Yorker  doesn't 
dispute  for  a  minute,  and  they  match  again  and  Ben 
wins  that,  too,  so  there's  nothing  to  do  but  take  the 
New  Yorker's  watch  away  from  him.  He  removes  it 
carefully  off  a  leather  fob  with  a  gilt  acorn  on  it  and 
hands  it  slowly  to  Ben.  It  was  one  of  these  extra 
superior  dollar  watches  that  cost  three  dollars. 
The  New  Yorker  looked  very  stung,  indeed.  You 


396  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

could  hear  him  saying  to  himself,  "Serves  me  right 
for  gambling  with  a  stranger!"  Ben  feels  these 
suspicions  and  is  hurt  by  'em  so  he  says  to  Jeff,  just 
to  show  the  New  Yorker  he's  an  honest  sport,  that 
he'll  stake  his  two  watches  against  Jeff's  solid  silver 
watch  that  he  won  in  a  bucking  contest  in  1890. 
Jeff  says  he's  on;  so  they  match  and  Ben  wins  again, 
now  having  three  watches.  Then  Lon  Price  comes 
back  from  cavorting  with  this  amiable  jade  of  the 
younger  dancing  set  at  the  next  table  and  Ben  makes 
him  put  up  his  gold  seven- jewelled  hunting-case 
watch  against  the  three  and  Ben  wins  again,  now 
having  four  watches. 

Lon  says  "Easy  come,  easy  go!"  and  moves  over 
to  the  next  table  again  to  help  out  with  the  silver 
bucket  of  champagne  he's  ordered,  taking  Jeff  Tuttle 
with  him  to  present  to  his  old  friends  that  he's  known 
for  all  of  twenty  minutes.  The  New  Yorker  is  now 
more  suspicious  then  ever  of  Ben;  his  wan  beauty 
is  marred  by  a  cynical  smile  and  his  hair  has  come 
unglued  in  a  couple  of  places.  Ben  is  more  sensitive 
than  ever  to  these  suspicions  of  his  new  pal  so  he  calls 
on  Jake  Berger  to  match  his  watch  against  the  four. 
Jake  takes  out  his  split-second  repeater  and  him  and 
Ben  match  coins  and  this  time  Ben  is  lucky  enough 
to  lose,  thereby  showing  his  dear  old  New  Yorker 
that  he  ain't  a  crook  after  all.  But  the  New  Yorker 
still  looks  very  shrewd  and  robbed  and  begins  to  gulp 
the  champagne  in  a  greedy  manner.  You  can  hear 
him  calling  Jake  a  confederate.  Jake  sees  it  plain 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          397 

enough,  that  the  lad  thinks  he's  been  high-graded, 
rso  he  calls  over  our  waiter  and  crowds  all  five  watches 
onto  him.  "Take  these  home  to  the  little  ones,"  says 
.Jake,  and  dismisses  the  matter  from  his  mind  by  put 
ting  a  wine  glass  up  to  his  ear  and  listening  into  it 
with  a  rapt  expression  that  shows  he's  hearing  the 
roar  of  the  ocean  up  on  Alaska's  rockbound  coast. 

The  New  Yorker  is  a  mite  puzzled  by  this,  but  I 
can  see  it  don't  take  him  long  to  figure  out  that  the 
waiter  is  also  a  confederate.  Anyway,  he's  been 
robbed  of  his  watch  forever  and  falls  to  the  cham 
pagne  again  very  eager  and  moody.  It  was  plain 
he  didn't  know  what  a  high-powered  drink  he  was 
trifling  with.  And  Ben  was  moody,  too,  by  now. 
He  quit  recalling  old  times  and  sacred  memories  to 
the  New  Yorker.  If  the  latter  had  tried  to  break  up 
the  party  by  leaving  at  this  point  I  guess  Ben  would 
of  let  him  go.  But  he  didn't  try;  he  just  set  there 
soggily  drinking  champagne  to  drown  the  memory  of 
his  lost  watch.  And  pretty  soon  Ben  has  to  order 
another  quart  of  this  twelve-dollar  beverage.  The 
New  Yorker  keeps  right  on  with  the  new  bottle, 
daring  it  to  do  its  worst  and  it  does;  he  was  soon 
speaking  out  of  a  dense  fog  when  he  spoke  at  all. 

With  his  old  pal  falling  into  this  absent  mood  Ben 
throws  off  his  own  depression  and  mingles  a  bit  with 
the  table  of  old  New  York  families  where  Lon  Price 
is  now  paying  the  checks.  They  was  the  real  New 
Yorkers;  they'd  never  had  a  moment's  distrust  of 
Lon  after  he  ordered  the  first  time  and  told  the  waiter 


398          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

to  keep  the  glasses  brimming.  Jeff  Tuttle  was  now 
dancing  in  an  extreme  manner  with  a  haggard  society 
bud  aged  thirty-five,  and  only  Jake  and  me  was  left 
at  our  table.  We  didn't  count  the  New  Yorker  any 
longer;  he  was  merely  raising  his  glass  to  his  lips 
at  regular  intervals.  He  moved  something  like  an 
automatic  chess  player  I  once  see.  The  time  passed 
rapidly  for  a  couple  hours  more,  with  Jake  Berger 
keeping  up  his  ceaseless  chatter  as  usual.  He  did 
speak  once,  though,  after  an  hour's  silence.  He  said 
in  an  audible  tone  tjiat  the  New  Yorker  was  a  human 
hangnail,  no  matter  where  he  was  born. 

And  so  the  golden  moments  flitted  by,  with  me 
watching  the  crazy  crowd,  until  they  began  to  fall 
away  and  the  waiters  was  piling  chairs  on  the  naked 
tables  at  the  back  of  the  room.  Then  with  some 
difficulty  we  wrenched  Ben  and  Lon  and  Jeff  from 
the  next  table  and  got  out  into  the  crisp  air  of  dawn. 
The  New  Yorker  was  now  sunk  deep  in  a  trance 
and  just  stood  where  he  was  put,  with  his  hat  on  the 
wrong  way.  The  other  boys  had  cheered  up  a  lot 
owing  to  their  late  social  career.  Jeff  Tuttle  said  it 
was  all  nonsense  about  its  being  hard  to  break  into 
New  York  society,  because  look  what  he'd  done  in 
one  brief  evening  without  trying — and  he  flashed 
three  cards  on  which  telephone  numbers  is  written 
in  dainty  feminine  hands.  He  said  if  a  modest  and 
retiring  stranger  like  himself  could  do  that  much, 
just  think  what  an  out-and-out  social  climber  might 
achieve ! 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  399 

Right  then  I  was  ready  to  call  it  an  absorbing  and 
instructive  evening  and  get  to  bed.  But  no!  Ben 
Sutton  at  sight  of  his  now  dazed  New  Yorker  has 
resumed  his  brooding  and  suddenly  announces  that 
we  must  all  make  a  pilgrimage  to  West  Ninth  Street 
and  romantically  view  his  old  home  which  his  father 
told  him  to  get  out  of  twenty-five  years  ago,  and 
which  we  can  observe  by  the  first  tender  rays  of 
dawn.  He  says  he  has  been  having  precious  illu 
sions  shattered  all  evening,  but  this  will  be  a  holy 
moment  that  nothing  can  queer — not  even  a  born 
New  Yorker  that  hasn't  made  the  grade  and  is  at  this 
moment  so  vitrified  that  he'd  be  a  mere  glass  crash 
if  some  one  pushed  him  over. 

I  didn't  want  to  go  a  bit.  I  could  see  that  Jeff 
Tuttle  would  soon  begin  dragging  a  hip,  and  the 
streets  at  that  hour  was  no  place  for  Lon  Price,  with 
his  naturally  daring  nature  emphasized,  as  it  were, 
from  drinking  this  here  imprisoned  laughter  of  the 
man  that  owned  the  joint  we  had  just  left.  But 
Ben  was  pleading  in  a  broken  voice  for  one  sight  of 
the  old  home  with  its  boyhood  memories  clustering 
about  its  modest  front  and  I  was  afraid  he'd  get  to 
crying,  so  I  give  in  wearily  and  we  was  once  more 
encased  in  taxicabs  and  on  our  way  to  the  sacred 
scene.  Ben  had  quite  an  argument  with  the  drivers 
when  he  give  'em  the  address.  They  kept  telling  him 
there  wasn't  a  thing  open  down  there,  but  he  finally 
got  his  aim  understood.  The  New  Yorker's  petrified 
remains  was  carefully  tucked  into  the  cab  with  Ben. 


400  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

And  Ben  suffered  another  cruel  blow  at  the  end  of 
the  ride.  He  climbed  out  of  the  cab  in  a  reverent 
manner,  hoping  to  be  overcome  by  the  sight  of  the 
cherished  old  home,  and  what  did  he  find?  He  just 
couldn't  believe  it  at  first.  The  dear  old  house  had 
completely  disappeared  and  in  its  place  was  a  granite 
office  building  eighteen  stories  high.  Ben  just  stood 
off  and  looked  up  at  it,  too  overcome  for  words. 
Up  near  the  top  a  monster  brass  sign  in  writing 
caught  the  silver  light  of  dawn.  The  sign  sprawled 
clear  across  the  building  and  said  PANTS  EX 
CLUSIVELY.  Still  above  this  was  the  firm's  name 
in  the  same  medium — looking  like  a  couple  of  them 
hard-lettered  towns  that  get  evacuated  up  in  Poland. 

Poor  stricken  Ben  looked  in  silence  a  long  time. 
We  all  felt  his  suffering  and  kept  silent,  too.  Even 
Jeff  Tuttle  kept  still — who  all  the  way  down  had 
been  singing  about  old  Bill  Bailey  who  played  the 
Ukelele  in  Honolulu  Town.  It  was  a  solemn  mo 
ment.  After  a  few  more  minutes  of  silent  grief 
Ben  drew  himself  together  and  walked  off  without 
saying  a  word.  I  thought  walking  would  be  a  good 
idea  for  all  of  us,  especially  Lon  and  Jeff,  so  Jake  paid 
the  taxi  drivers  and  we  followed  on  foot  after  the 
chief  mourner.  The  fragile  New  Yorker  had  been 
exhumed  and  placed  in  an  upright  position  and  he 
walked,  too,  when  he  understood  what  was  wanted 
of  him;  he  didn't  say  a  word,  just  did  what  was  told 
him  like  one  of  these  boys  that  the  professor  hypno 
tizes  on  the  stage.  I  herded  the  bunch  along  about 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          401 

half  a  block  back  of  Ben,  feeling  it  was  delicate  to 
let  him  wallow  alone  in  his  emotions. 

We  got  over  to  Broadway,  turned  up  that,  and 
worked  on  through  that  dinky  little  grass  plot  they 
call  a  square,  kind  of  aimless  like  and  wondering 
where  Ben  in  his  grief  would  lead  us.  The  day  was 
well  begun  by  this  time  and  the  passing  cars  was  full 
of  very  quiet  people  on  their  way  to  early  work. 
Jake  Berger  said  these  New  Yorkers  would  pay  for  it 
sooner  or  later,  burning  the  candle  at  both  ends  this 
way — dancing  all  night  and  then  starting  off  to  work. 

Then  up  a  little  way  we  catch  sight  of  a  regular  old- 
fashioned  horse-car  going  crosstown.  Ben  has 
stopped  this  and  is  talking  excitedly  to  the  driver  so 
we  hurry  up  and  find  he's  trying  to  buy  the  car  from 
the  driver.  Yes,  sir;  he  says  its  the  last  remnant  of 
New  York  when  it  was  little  and  old  and  he  wants  to 
take  it  back  to  Nome  as  a  souvenir.  Anybody  might 
of  thought  he'd  been  drinking.  He's  got  his  roll  out 
and  wants  to  pay  for  the  car  right  there.  The  driver 
is  a  cold-looking  old  boy  with  gray  chin  whiskers 
showing  between  his  cap  and  his  comforter  and  he's 
indignantly  telling  Ben  it  can't  be  done.  By  the 
time  we  get  there  the  conductor  has  come  around  and 
wants  to  know  what  they're  losing  all  this  time  for. 
He  also  says  they  can't  sell  Ben  the  car  and  says 
further  that  we'd  all  better  go  home  and  sleep  it  off, 
so  Ben  hands  'em  each  a  ten  spot,  the  driver  lets  off 
his  brake,  and  the  old  ark  rattles  on  while  Ben's  eyes 
is  suffused  with  a  suspicious  moisture,  as  they  say. 


402          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Ben  now  says  we  must  stand  right  on  this  corner  to 
watch  these  cars  go  by — about  once  every  hour.  We 
argued  with  him  whilst  we  shivered  in  the  bracing 
winelike  air,  but  Ben  was  stubborn.  We  might  of 
been  there  yet  if  something  hadn't  diverted  him  from 
this  evil  design.  It  was  a  string  of  about  fifty  Ital 
ians  that  just  then  come  out  of  a  subway  entrance. 
They  very  plainly  belonged  to  the  lower  or  labouring 
classes  and  I  judged  they  was  meant  for  work  on  the 
up-and-down  street  we  stood  on,  that  being  already 
torn  up  recklessly  till  it  looked  like  most  other  streets 
in  the  same  town.  They  stood  around  talking  in  a 
delirious  or  Italian  manner  till  their  foreman  un 
locked  a  couple  of  big  piano  boxes.  Out  of  these  they 
took  crowbars,  adzes,  shovels,  and  other  instruments 
of  their  calling.  Ben  Sutton  has  been  standing  there 
soddenly  waiting  for  another  dear  old  horse-car  to 
come  by,  but  suddenly  he  takes  notice  of  these  ban 
dits  with  the  tools  and  I  see  an  evil  gleam  come  into 
his  tired  eyes.  He  assumes  a  businesslike  air,  struts 
over  to  the  foreman  of  the  bunch,  and  has  some  quick 
words  with  him,  making  sweeping  motions  of  the  arm 
up  and  down  the  cross  street  where  the  horse-cars  run. 
After  a  minute  of  this  I'm  darned  if  the  whole  bunch 
didn't  scatter  out  and  begin  to  tear  up  the  pavement 
along  the  car-track  on  this  cross  street.  Ben  tripped 
back  to  us  looking  cheerful  once  more. 

"They  wouldn't  sell  me  the  car,"  he  says,  "so  I'm 
going  to  take  back  a  bunch  of  the  dear  old  rails. 
They'll  be  something  to  remind  me  of  the  dead  past. 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          403 

Just  think !  I  rode  over  those  very  rails  when  I  was  a 
tot." 

We  was  all  kind  of  took  back  at  this,  and  I 
promptly  warned  Ben  that  we'd  better  beat  it  before 
we  got  pinched.  But  Ben  is  confident.  He  says 
no  crime  could  be  safer  in  New  York  than  setting  a 
bunch  of  Italians  to  tearing  up  a  street-car  track;  that 
no  one  could  ever  possibly  suspect  it  wasn't  all  right, 
though  he  might  have  to  be  underhanded  to  some 
extent  in  getting  his  souvenir  rails  hauled  off.  He 
said  he  had  told  the  foreman  that  he  was  the  con 
tractor's  brother  and  had  been  sent  with  this  new 
order  and  the  foreman  had  naturally  believed  it,  Ben 
looking  like  a  rich  contractor  himself. 

And  there  they  was  at  work,  busy  as  beavers, 
gouging  up  the  very  last  remnant  of  little  old  New 
York  when  it  was  that.  Ben  rubbed  his  hands  in 
ecstasy  and  pranced  up  and  down  watching  'em  for 
awhile.  Then  he  went  over  and  told  the  foreman 
there'd  be  extra  pay  for  all  hands  if  they  got  a  whole 
block  tore  up  by  noon,  because  this  was  a  rush  job. 
Hundreds  of  people  was  passing,  mind  you,  including 
a  policeman  now  and  then,  but  no  one  took  any  no 
tice  of  a  sight  so  usual.  All  the  same  the  rest  of  us 
edged  north  about  half  a  block,  ready  to  make  a 
quick  getaway.  Ben  kept  telling  us  we  was  foolishly 
scared.  He  offered  to  bet  any  one  in  the  party  ten  to 
one  in  thousands  that  he  could  switch  his  gang  over 
to  Broadway  and  have  a  block  of  that  track  up  before 
any  one  got  wise.  There  was  no  takers. 


404  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

Ben  was  now  so  pleased  with  himself  and  his  little 
band  of  faithful  workers  that  he  even  begun  to  feel 
kindly  again  toward  his  New  Yorker  who  was  still 
standing  in  one  spot  with  glazed  eyes.  He  goes  up 
and  tries  to  engage  him  in  conversation,  but  the  lad 
can't  hear  any  more  than  he  can  see.  Ben's  efforts, 
however,  finally  start  him  to  muttering  something. 
He  says  it  over  and  over  to  himself  and  at  last  we 
make  out  what  it  is.  He  is  saying:  "I'd  like  to  buy  a 
little  drink  for  the  party  m'self ." 

"The  poor  creature  is  delirious,"  says  Jake  Berger. 

But  Ben  slaps  him  on  the  back  and  tells  him  he's  a 
good  sport  and  he'll  give  him  a  couple  of  these  rails 
to  take  to  his  old  New  York  home;  he  says  they  can 
be  crossed  over  the  mantel  and  will  look  very  quaint. 
The  lad  kind  of  shivered  under  Ben's  hearty  blow 
and  seemed  to  struggle  out  of  his  trance  for  a 
minute.  His  eyes  unglazed  and  he  looks  around 
and  says  how  did  he  get  here  and  where  is  it?  Ben 
tells  him  he's  among  friends  and  that  they  two  are 
the  only  born  New  Yorkers  left  in  the  world,  and 
so  on,  when  the  lad  reaches  into  the  pocket  of  his 
natty  topcoat  for  a  handkerchief  and  pulls  out  with 
it  a  string  of  funny  little  tickets — about  two  feet 
of  'em.  Ben  grabs  these  up  with  a  strange  look  in 
his  eyes 

"Bridge  tickets!"  he  yells.  Then  he  grabs  his 
born  New  Yorker  by  the  shoulders  and  shakes  him 
still  further  out  of  dreamland. 

"What  street  in  New  York  is  your  old  home  on?" 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP  405 

he  demands  savagely.  The  lad  blinks  his  fishy  eyes 
and  fixes  his  hat  on  that  Ben  has  shook  loose. 

"Cranberry  Street,"  says  he. 

"Cranberry  Street!  Hell,  that's  Brooklyn,  and 
you  claimed  New  York,"  says  Ben,  shaking  the  hat 
loose  again. 

"Greater  New  York,"  says  the  lad  pathetically, 
and  pulls  his  hat  firmly  down  over  his  ears. 

Ben  looked  at  the  imposter  with  horror  in  his  eyes. 
"Brooklyn!"  he  muttered — "the  city  of  the  un- 
buried  dead !  So  that  was  the  secret  of  your  strange 
behaviour?  And  me  warming  you  in  my  bosom,  you 
viper!" 

But  the  crook  couldn't  hear  him  again,  having 
lapsed  into  his  trance  and  become  entirely  rigid  and 
foolish.  In  the  cold  light  of  day  his  face  now  looked 
like  a  plaster  cast  of  itself.  Ben  turned  to  us  with  a 
hunted  look.  "Blow  after  blow  has  fallen  upon  me 
to-night,"  he  says  tearfully,  "but  this  is  the  most 
cruel  of  all.  I  can't  believe  in  anything  after  this. 
I  can't  even  believe  them  street-car  rails  are  the 
originals.  Probably  they  were  put  down  last 
week." 

"Then  let's  get  out  of  this  quick,"  I  says  to  him. 
"We  been  exposing  ourselves  to  arrest  here  long 
enough  for  a  bit  of  false  sentiment  on  your  part." 

"I  gladly  go,"  says  Ben,  "but  wait  one  second." 
He  stealthily  approaches  the  Greater  New  Yorker 
and  shivers  him  to  wakefulness  with  another  hearty 
wallop  on  the  back.  "Listen  carefully,"  says  Ben  as 


406  SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

the  lad  struggles  out  of  the  dense  fog.  "Do  you  see 
those  workmen  tearing  up  that  car- track?" 

"  Yes,  I  see  it,"  says  the  lad  distinctly.  "  I've  often 
seen  it." 

"Very  well.  Listen  to  me  and  remember  your  life 
may  hang  on  it.  You  go  over  there  and  stand  right 
by  them  till  they  get  that  track  up  and  don't  you 
let  any  one  stop  them.  Do  you  hear?  Stand  right 
there  and  make  them  work,  and  if  a  policeman  or  any 
one  tries  to  make  trouble  you  soak  him.  Remember ! 
I'm  leaving  those  men  in  your  charge.  I  shall  hold 
you  personally  responsible  for  them." 

The  lad  don't  say  a  word  but  begins  to  walk  in  a 
brittle  manner  toward  the  labourers.  We  saw  him 
stop  and  point  a  threatening  finger  at  them,  then  in 
stantly  freeze  once  more.  It  was  our  last  look  at  him. 
We  got  everybody  on  a  north-bound  car  with  some 
trouble.  Lon  Price  had  gone  to  sleep  standing  up 
and  Jeff  Tuttle,  who  was  now  looking  like  the  society 
burglar  after  a  tough  night's  work  at  his  trade,  was 
getting  turbulent  and  thirsty.  He  didn't  want  to 
ride  on  a  common  street  car.  "I  want  a  tashicrab," 
he  says,  "and  I  want  to  go  back  to  that  Louis 
Chateau  room  and  dance  the  tangle."  But  we  per 
suaded  him  and  got  safe  up  to  a  restaurant  on  Sixth 
Avenue  where  breakfast  was  had  by  all  without  fur 
ther  adventure.  Jeff  strongly  objected  to  this  res 
taurant  at  first,  though,  because  he  couldn't  hear  an 
orchestra  in  it.  He  said  he  couldn't  eat  his  breakfast 
without  an  orchestra.  He  did,  however,  ordering 


SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP          407 

apple  pie  and  ice  cream  and  a  gin  fizz  to  come.  Lon 
Price  was  soon  sleeping  like  a  tired  child  over  his  ham 
and  eggs,  and  Jeff  went  night-night,  too,  before  his 
second  gin  fizz  arrived. 

Ben  ordered  a  porterhouse  steak,  family  style,  con 
suming  it  in  a  moody  rage  like  a  man  that  has  been 
ground-sluiced  at  every  turn.  He  said  he  felt  like 
ending  it  all  and  sometimes  wished  he'd  been  in  the 
cab  that  plunged  into  one  of  the  forty-foot  holes  in 
Broadway  a  couple  of  nights  before.  Jake  Berger 
had  ordered  catfish  and  waffles,  with  a  glass  of  In 
valid  port.  He  burst  into  speech  once  more,  too. 
He  said  the  nights  in  New  York  were  too  short  to  get 
much  done.  That  if  they  only  had  nights  as  long  as 
Alaska  the  town  might  become  famous.  "As  it  is," 
he  says,  "I  don't  mind  flirting  with  this  city  now  and 
then,  but  I  wouldn't  want  to  marry  it." 

Well,  that  about  finished  the  evening,  with  Lon  and 
Jeff  making  the  room  sound  like  a  Pullman  palace  car 
at  midnight.  Oh,  yes;  there  was  one  thing  more. 
On  the  day  after  the  events  recorded  in  the  last  chap 
ter,  as  it  says  in  novels,  there  was  a  piece  in  one  of  the 
live  newspapers  telling  that  a  well-dressed  man  of 
thirty-five,  calling  himself  Clifford  J.  Hotchkiss  and 
giving  a  Brooklyn  address,  was  picked  up  in  a  dazed 
condition  by  patrolman  Cohen  who  had  found  him  at 
tempting  to  direct  the  operations  of  a  gang  of  work 
men  engaged  in  repairing  a  crosstown-car  track.  He 
had  been  sent  to  the  detention  ward  of  Bellevue  to 
await  examination  as  to  his  sanity,  though  insisting 


408          SOMEWHERE  IN  RED  GAP 

that  he  was  the  victim  of  a  gang  of  footpads  who  had 
plied  him  with  liquor  and  robbed  him  of  his  watch. 
I  showed  the  piece  to  Ben  Sutton  and  Ben  sent  him  up 
a  pillow  of  forget-me-nots  with  "Rest"  spelled  on  it — 
without  the  sender's  card. 

No;  not  a  word  in  it  about  the  street-car  track 
being  wrongfully  tore  up.  I  guess  it  was  like  Ben 
said;  no  one  ever  would  find  out  about  that  in  New 
York.  My  lands !  here  it  is  ten-thirty  and  I  got  to  be 
on  the  job  when  them  hayers  start  to-morrow  A.  M. 
A  body  would  think  I  hadn't  a  care  on  earth  when  I 
get  started  on  anecdotes  of  my  past. 


THE  END 


THE  COUNTRY  LIFE  PRESS 
GARDEN  CITY,   N.  Y. 


j 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


REC'D  LD 


JUL23195^871967_SS_ 

RECEIVED 


30%r'63G* 

MAR  2  7  '67 

-2  PUT 

LOAM  DS 

,  .    -) 

MAP  1  7  1.4KM 

LD  21A-50m-4,'59 
(A1724slO)476B 


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